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POSTGAME QUOTES
JUNE 22, 2004
COMETS COACH VAN CHANCELLOR
On the game:
"There's no other team in America that needed that anymore than we did. What a game. Sheila Lambert had some kind of coming out party. Felicia Ragland came in and gave us a lift. Sheryl Swoopes had a tremendous second half. We outrebounded Seattle and that's not the norm. We won a game on the road in front of 8,000 ... I can't say enough about the Comets. Our defense tonight was outstanding. This was a game we needed. It was a complete game for us. You beat the team that's playing the best basketball in our league, on the road, that's big. That's really big.”
On Sheila Lambert:
“We have to create more plays for her - we already had made that decision. She can play. She can be a star in this league. That game was not an exception to the rule."
On stopping Lauren Jackson and Betty Lennox:
“We doubled her every time she touched the ball. Another key play for us was we made an adjustment at halftime and switched who was guarding Betty Lennox. I'm not going to tell you who, but that was a big defensive assignment. Lennox was killing us."
SHERYL SWOOPES
On the game:
"It was a great game. We knew coming in it was going to be tough because they hadn't lost at home yet. I felt our confidence was there from the first time we played them at home. We felt like we let that one slip away and obviously wanted the opportunity to redeem ourselves. It was a completely different game from the last time we played them-it was a great team win. Every player contributed. This was a huge win for us after losing two in a row. We beat a very good team that was playing extremely well. That says a lot about the talent we have on this team and the confidence we have in ourselves and each other."
SHEILA LAMBERT
On the game:
"It was fun coming back home (to Seattle). It was just a plus to win this game tonight. Everybody did an incredible job. We made a pact to stick together and that's exactly what we did. We told ourselves, if we're losing, we're going down fighting, if we're winning, we're going to win fighting. That's the kind of team we want to be. It's a huge win. I can't even put it into words. I can't necessarily say it's going to be a turnaround game for us, but I hope so."
On what the difference for her was in this game:
"We had lost two - that was my motivation. We had to get a win, whether it was at home, in Sacramento, in Houston; we had to get this win. It was just a plus that my family was here and able to actually watch me get minutes. We just did a good job."
STORM COACH ANNE DONOVAN
On the game:
"I think Houston, they came at it. This was a game they were very hungry for, from start to finish, no matter who was on the floor. Loose balls were theirs, hustle plays were theirs. And I thought they were super-aggressive and we didn’t respond."
On whether Houston 'wanted it more':
"It’s such a cliché, so I hate to use that. I’ve been trying to not use that. They certainly played a lot harder than we did."
On what Houston did differently from last week's Storm win:
"They did tend to slow the game down. We didn’t get a whole lot in transition. The first 17 minutes of the game, we played right into their hand. They wanted us to take jump shots; that’s what we did. The first 17 minutes, that’s all we did. Then we started getting the ball inside a little bit or going inside and then out and it freed things up. They have a way of encouraging you to do something they want you to do, and we did it. We lived and died early in the game with the jump shot."
On the momentum:
"I didn’t feel like it ever became ours. We had a great crowd here, good energy. We kept trying to make our run, but it was like we were running into a brick wall. They would not relinquish it, so I never felt like we wrestled it back from them."
On whether she can use a loss as motivation:
"That’s another cliché I hate, that a loss is a good loss. I don’t believe in any of that. Maybe I’m too much of a perfectionist, but I believe that every night you come out and mentally and physically get yourself ready to play and win a game. I think we’re good enough that we should expect to win and play that way. I don’t think we had that approach tonight.
"We were half a game out of the playoffs last year, so we are fully cognizant of the fact that every game matters. We don’t want it to come down to a half a game, whether we qualify for the playoffs or not. Will I use it to my advantage? I don’t know. Would I say we were overly sharp yesterday or in shooting practice today? We were not. To me, we played the way we played the way we practiced."
On whether the loss was due to fatigue from the Storm's road trip:
"Could very well be. But again, that’s an excuse. To me, in this league, with as many good teams as there are this year, you’ve got to be ready every night. They’re on the road as much as we are right now."
On Sheila Lambert:
"I think early this year, I talked about how Betty (Lennox) was in a box. I think Sheila was in a box with the lid closed. Now he’s just letting her go more and more, and as she has more success, she’s able to do more things and he’s more comfortable with her and confident. I don’t think our team has seen all the things Sheila can do."
SUE BIRD
On the play of Lambert:
"She played a great game. I didn’t underestimate her or anything like that, she just played really well. I mean, 7-for-10, that’s pretty good. She stepped up for her team and did a good job."
On the Comets:
"Any team in the WNBA you can’t take lightly, especially when you play them twice in the last five days. That can definitely present some problems. It’s hard to beat a team, and to see them twice close together is tough. They came out ready. They had a game plan and they executed."
LAUREN JACKSON
On what was different this time against Houston:
"This time we lost. At the end, they really stepped up, and we sort of stayed at the same pace. We all have games like this and we just have to move on."
On the team's energy:
"They were desperate for a win. Unfortunately, we didn’t have high energy today; we didn’t have any energy at all. Even our cockiness, to a degree, we didn’t display and it’s upsetting, but we’ll learn from it and next game I’ll be cocky as heck. It’s bad that we lost, but it’s not the end of the world, it’s just one game. I’m looking forward to next game."
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