vs. 
Western Conference First Round Game 3
POSTGAME QUOTES AUGUST 20, 2002
COMETS COACH VAN CHANCELLOR
On referee Bill Stokes:
"My first thoughts are for Bill Stokes and his family. You hate to see that happen to any human being. I've known Bill ever since I was in the SEC, what a great guy."
On the game:
"What a great basketball game. They made a lot of tremendous plays - you have to give them credit. Tough way to end the season. The decision to resume the game was made by the WNBA, I was not in on that decision. They just told me we were going to play in five minutes. At that time they had gotten him stable, he was breathing on his own and I went into the dressing room. I'm sure we're going to be criticized but I didn't see another solution to the problem in my mind. I didn't know what to do. In my opinion, this was the toughest situation I've been in as a coach in a long time."
On the players coming back and having to play:
"It was really hard, it was really difficult. It was a tough loss, tough night. It was a tough night for him, tough night for a human being. Tough night for us. I don't know that it took us a long time to get over what happened on the court (with Bill Stokes). I can't answer that. I'm going to have to have time to digest everything. I don't have the answers to all your questions. I just don't know. At the same time, I don't want to take anything away from Utah. It's the first time that Utah will be going to the Western Conference Finals, I want to be really, really careful that I don't try to do anything that takes away from them going on. I also don't want to minimize what happened to Bill Stokes. It's a pretty tough situation for me right now."
On the play of Utah:
"You've got to give them credit. They made some incredible plays in the last two minutes of the game. I thought Natalie Williams was tough, she looked really good. She brought an 'A' game in here tonight. Played 39 minutes, 25 points, eight rebounds."
On what was said in the locker room at the game stoppage:
"It was the toughest locker room I've had to go to. I thought we played well from a game point of view. I thought we just played hard, played so gutsy, played so tough. I thought the key play of the whole game was when we had one second on the shot clock and they ran a little spinout play and shot a jump shot. That two points made the hill to high to climb."
On whether this was his toughest loss as a coach:
"I would say that Teresa Weatherspoon (Game 2, 1999 WNBA Finals) was a tough loss, but I had another game to come back to, so yes, this was the toughest loss ever I've had here. It would be different if we hadn't fought so hard. They just made so many plays; they made shot after shot. (Margo) Dydek made two 3-pointers."
SHERYL SWOOPES
On how difficult was it to come back and play after stoppage of play:
"It was pretty difficult. The hardest part was for us to stay focused and try to get back into the game. Obviously, you can't make any excuses, because some kind of way Utah found their way to stay focused and keep their composure. But it was tough and obviously you have to look at a situation like that and I was sitting there and I said it could easily have been any one of us. It's unfortunate and we said a couple of prayers for him and his family and hopefully he would be OK. It was tough. To actually sit out there and see it happen. In some kind of way you just have to put it out of your mind and try to finish a basketball game. It was pretty difficult, but we tried to come back out and regain our focus and concentrate on what we had to do, but we just couldn't get over the hump."
On whether she thought the referees made the right decision to continue the game:
"I don't know. That is not a decision for me to make. I thought the other two refs came out and a did as good of a job as they could have possibly done."
On the difficulty of the loss:
"It's hard right now, very hard to swallow. Every year you set a goal of what you want to accomplish and, obviously, that was to get an opportunity to get back to the championship, get back to the Finals. And it didn't happen. I said all along Utah is a very good team and we tried to come in here tonight and try to get them out of the game early. But you are playing a team that is playing very well right now. They are playing well together and it is pretty hard to stop them. Every single player on that team really stepped up when they needed to, especially when we had that little break and we came back out, and whatever they (Utah) said, whatever they (Utah) did in the locker room worked. We never could find a way to gather ourselves and come back out and do what we had to do and they did. The better team won."
STARZZ COACH CANDI HARVEY
On the last plays of the game:
"If Swoopes had gotten one more look at it, it probably would be a tie game. And we'd probably still be playing, but that wasn't the case and for whatever reason, we were meant to win."
On resuming play after official collapsed and the officiating for the rest of the game:
"I am so proud of my players not as players but as people, because they got into that locker room and they were totally committed to praying for Bill and we were not even thinking about basketball. The one thing they said, this is a life lesson. We have the opportunity to run up and down and play games we love and we needed to go out there and have fun and do that as they were playing for Bill (Stokes). Just tried to calm them down, they were obviously, both teams, were very upset. I thought they handled it the best way they could. I thought everyone handled it the best way they could. I didn't have any idea (what decision would be made on resuming the game). I guess Val Ackerman (President of the WNBA) and her leadership was the big point and whatever they decided and the officials. I'll say this, I thought the officials, Roy (Gulbeyan) and Lisa (Mattingly), what class acts they were, both coming out and doing the best job that they can, makes you guilty to even argue a call from that point on. I thought they just handled themselves with so much class. Whatever they told us to do, we were going to do. Come back tomorrow, we'd come back tomorrow and play tonight, obviously we'd do that too."
On Marie Ferdinand taking the last free throws of the game:
"We wanted the ball in her hands because she was making a lot of things happen. Just did a super job down the stretch. Guess she was 6-for-6. She stepped up in pressure."
On the play of Natalie Williams:
"Natalie and Margo (Dydek) were just outstanding. They both just had a great series. It was our game plan from the beginning and it will continue to be, pound the ball in the paint, inside-out and driving. Some other people stepped up, hit some big shots, Jennifer's (Azzi) shot at the buzzer, that was one of those plays that didn't go our way the other night that went our way tonight."
On how big a deal this is for Utah to be in the Conference Finals:
"I don't know the other people that used to coach them. They (Utah) made a commitment, I've surrounded myself with good people and good players, and the players from the beginning had some goals and they stuck to it. It means a lot for our city, it means a lot for our franchise, so hopefully they'll let us stay now."
On playing L.A. next:
"They're the champions and they give us fits. We do have some matchup problems with them, but we're playing with so much more confidence than when we played them the last time. Had a substantial lead and let it slip away. So as confident and focused as our basketball team is right now, and as good a job as they're doing with the game plans, I think we'll be ready to play them. They're a tremendous basketball team and they have a lot of weapons, and we're going to have to play our game to beat them."
NATALIE WILLIAMS
On the victory:
"It feels great. We gave everything we had tonight. This was a very interesting and different basketball game, with what happened in the second half. It was just hard to come back form, but it just pulled our team closer together. We're a very close-knit team anyway and it just made us more of that. You never know when it's going to be your last game and we wanted to go out there and give everything we had tonight, no matter the outcome and I think we did that tonight."
On facing L.A. next in the Conference Finals:
"It feels great. We've had some very tough matchups with L.A. thus far and we didn't feel like we got a lot of respect even though we're one of three teams in the league with 20 wins this year and I think now people are going to take a look at us. We're playing very well right now. We've got it going, we're going to play L.A. very tough. They're a great team, but we're feeling good and we're going to celebrate tonight and prepare for L.A. tomorrow."
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