Everything Duke coach Kara Lawson said after the South Carolina game

Duke women’s basketball coach Kara Lawson spoke with the media Thursday night following her team’s 81-70 loss to South Carolina. Here’s everything she had to say.

Opening statement

We didn’t start the game as we hoped, and we just spent the game trying to fight out of the hole, and the hole was a little too deep with a team of that quality. I thought we showed some good resilience there in the second half to fight to make it, did we make it single digits? I think we did at one point. I was proud of that, proud of how they stayed in it. It’s easy to, when you’re down a lot, to kind of give into the game and give into the momentum, and we didn’t do that.

I knew from the beginning this game was going to be revelatory for us. What it does is it shows you your weaknesses and exposes you, and then you go back to work on them. So, I was excited about this game because of that. We need to know where our weak spots are, and we need to know what we need to improve. And now we go back to work on them and try to do just that.

A quick turnaround for us with ACC play starting on Sunday, but a really important game for us on Sunday to start conference. So, a lot of things, you can’t, you have to really love like the intensity and the competitiveness, and you have to really want to grow and improve and want to see where you struggle. 

So, I’m not happy with the result, of course. No one likes to lose, But I’m really happy that we got exposed in different ways because now we can hopefully grow as a team.

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You mentioned that you cut the lead to 8 there in the fourth quarter. What was it that was allowing y’all to get the lead down to single digits?

Honestly, I just thought we started to get some stops and were able to get out and run. I thought our offense had some pace to it. It’s most teams, it’s not like a huge revelation, but most teams play better on the run, right, in transition, you’re playing with pace, you maybe get numbers, you pass ahead, you cut. So I just thought we were able to play in that portion of the game more so than locked against the half-court defense, and I thought that triggered it.

I also thought the energy of Thomas and Donovan and Okananwa, I thought the three sophomores tonight really competed their hearts out. I was really just happy to see that from them. I love when players show themselves to you in these type of moments, and it was just awesome to see those three sophomores on the road just kind of have the urgency and compete and try their best to will us back in the game. And those moments you try to bottle up and talk about them with them because you can see that there’s something special there in their competitiveness, and it makes me excited to try and hone that and get that to come out more often.

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You talked about some things that you feel like you’ll need to work on going forward. In your mind, what are some of those things that you think?

I think just execution, being assignment correct, and then organization. Organization was really poor in the first quarter. They just got wide-open threes. That was not the game plan, in case you were wondering. To give their great shooters wide-open threes, that was not what we were looking to do. And so we were not matched up.

And I know that sounds simple, but we weren’t communicating appropriately, and we weren’t getting to our matchups quickly enough. And they did what a good team does. They made you pay, right? And once we got kind of that assignment correct and we got executing better, we started to make some headway against the lead. 

The other thing I would say was just our execution in the half-court. Again, we weren’t on the same page. We had some players running different plays and some other ones running different plays. And that’s my fault for not getting us on the same page and understanding the communication that goes into it on a road game and things like that. So, all of these things are fixable. And so we’ll go back and look.

When I say it’s revelatory, don’t mistake me. It’s revelatory for me, too. I have to be better preparing my team. I have to be better in the game to help them. It’s not just like it was revelatory; my players didn’t do well. Anything that you see on the court from Duke is a reflection of what I’ve taught them. And so our coaching staff as well, we’ve got to be better at making sure they’re assignment correct.

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You talked a little bit about Donovan and McConnell bringing some energy in the team, and one way they did that in this game was through rebounds. Your team outrebounded South Carolina. Can you just talk a little bit about the hustle and how you guys got some of those second-chance looks and second-chance shots up there?

Yeah, we felt like competing on the glass was going to be one of the keys in this game for us. I mean, they’re terrific on the glass. I think they’re margin 16, plus 16. They really dominate teams on the glass. So our goal was to be able to get some extra opportunities and be able to try to limit them to one shot.

So it’s great that we were able to out-rebound them. I don’t know, we don’t get a prize for that, or we don’t get a win in the win column, so I don’t know how great it is. But, but I am proud of the effort. And like I said, Donovan and Okananwa, they have an elite skill as rebounders. Okananwa led us in rebounding last year as a freshman guard. Think about how rare that is. She’s got a great motor. I’m just really proud of those two. I just thought they played really well tonight.

You mentioned getting some stops in the second half as maybe a key to be able to get yourself back in and cut it to 8. What are some of those fundamental things defensively that you guys thought you did really well to be able to not just trim into the lead, but kind of limit a lot of the scoring options that South Carolina has?

Yeah, I thought when we weren’t turning the ball over and we were able to kind of get our defense set, I thought we did a fairly good job of guarding them. And then it was really, to me, the limit to one shot. Our goal was to get them to take one contested shot.

That’s any defense’s goal. It’s not new or unique. Try to get them to take one contested shot and then finish with a box out. And that’s where I thought that Donovan in that stretch and Thomas in that stretch and Okananwa in that stretch really got in there and got some of those boards. And then we were able to push it up with pace.

This is two years in a row you’ve had South Carolina. Is there anything about this version of South Carolina that’s different? Maybe the scout, prepare for, play against. Anything you noticed that just might be different than what you had this time last year?

I mean, the obvious, right? I mean, there’s not a big player in the middle. You know, she’s terrific. I don’t want to say this, and then people, I don’t remember all the way last year, but I just know their bench this year is really good. I can’t compare this year and last year because I only saw them one time and I don’t really watch unless we’re about to play them.

But the firepower off the bench to me this year, with (MiLaysia Fulwiley) and (Tessa Johnson) and all the experience they’ve gained in their freshman year and how they can score and change the game. (Ashlyn Watkins) is a terrific player. And then the freshmen come in and they can score and things like that.

So, I think the depth is high level. It’s hard for me to compare this year and last year. I don’t really remember as much the bench last year, but I feel like we are coming into the game as 10 excellent players and you have to be prepared for that through the game for the depth and the way they can score.

You mentioned you’ve got a tough conference opponent coming up Virginia Tech this weekend. What’s going to be the messaging to bounce back and get ready to go for ACC play?

They know we got blasted in our ACC opener last year, okay? And I think that’s a good thing. It wasn’t in the moment, but I think it has their attention. We’ve got a block in here. Good team coming in and home. I think we’ll have their attention. They’re a focused group and they do a good job of understanding what it is we need to fix. It’s a quick turnaround for us. Obviously, we’ll just try to get back home and just get back to more of ourselves. And, like I said, those practical things, match-ups and everything. So, thank you all. Have a great night.

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