Question: What do you do after a game like that?
Laimbeer: Well, you watch a lot of film and stay up until three in the morning and try to figure out what you didn’t right. X and O wise, we have a couple of things we have to tweak, but a lot of it is just plain effort and desire, and wanting to win the basketball game and competing harder than we did yesterday.

Question: Were you a little surprised from you saw from your players last night?
Laimbeer: Yeah, a little. But I think you get to this spot and you want to have the most intense effort that you can; it just didn’t work out for us last night in the home game. They wanted it more than we did.

Question: How do you anticipate Swin Cash and Ruth Riley responding tomorrow?
Laimbeer: I hope they come with more energy and more determination. They just got physically pushed around on the inside and they have to step their game up mentally and physically.

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Shock Center Ruth Riley

Question: How do you handle it when you have a game like last night?
Riley: You are disappointed and then you realize it’s a five game series and you focus on the next game. We can play a lot better than we did and today we came in here and worked on some things.

Question: What is it going to take for the starting five to come out and have better games?
Riley: I know I can play a lot better, especially defensively. They took a lot of things away from us on our offensive end. This is the Finals and it’s not really the pressure of you have to win this game, but when we play together and we are all on the same page we are tough to beat.

Question: Is this where the inconsistent play your team has had all season work for you and you will be able to turn things around?
Riley: We know what we are capable of, we just have to focus and bring that energy for Game 2.

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Shock Forward Cheryl Ford

Question: What are your feelings about last night’s game?
Ford: We didn’t come ready to play. Some of us did and some of us didn’t. We talked about what it was going to take for us to win the game, and that was rebounding, didn’t give second shots and don’t turn the ball over. Obviously, we didn’t do done of the above.

Question: Is there anything positive you can take from that game?
Ford: Well, we finally started to fight at the end of the third, but that’s not enough. Hopefully, we can adjust and do better tomorrow.

Question: Are there any specific adjustments you have in mind?
Ford: We have to stop the turnovers, get on the loose balls and don’t give them any second shots.

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Sacramento Coach John Whisenant

Question: Will it be as easy as Game 1 to get another win in Game 2?
Whisenant: We played well and got them out of synch early and were able to prevail and keep it that way. Can we make that happen again, that’s a whole new game. It really means nothing, it’s not relevant. You would think they know it’s a whole new ball game and they will come with their guns loaded.

Question: Does your team have the mental strength you need?
Whisenant: It’s still going to come down to can we do our stuff better than they can do their stuff. Obviously, the fist game we won, but Bill [Laimbeer] tells me every game that they are going to win and sometimes they do and sometimes they don’t. How Friday night will be, I’m hoping we will come back and repeat our intensity. We will expect they will meet it with a great deal of determination.

Question: Can you talk about the playoff series and how your team was on for five games straight.
Whisenant:The fist game against LA we struggled. But, we have told our players that our system is built around winning when you don’t shoot well. When you shoot well it makes coaching easy. When we are playing well on our defensive end and make a lot of shots it makes it a lot easier and we have had some wins. We don’t want to get overconfident.

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Sacramento Guard Ticha Penicheiro

Question: Will you be able to repeat?
Penicheiro: It is hard to repeat. It’s hard to win one, but to repeat is really hard. I think it really took us a while to realize how hard it is to defend your title. Everybody comes hard at you every game and I don’t think we were ready mentally and physically. We woke up at the right time and we are clicking right now. I’ll take an okay regular season overa great playoffs.

Question: How much of this is mental?
Penicheiro: That is something that we always talk about. We have been fortunate enough to play well, but when things start going bad it is most important that the team stay together. You have to play well together and not start pointing fingers. When you are not making baskets and you are not playing good defense that’s when we start talking about coming together. When we are playing to win a championship you have to stick together and I think that’s the most important thing about our team. We really stick together during bad times and good times.

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Sacramento Forward Nicole Powell

Question: You guys didn’t seem to be doing too much celebrating last night.
Powell: I think I actually heard this in the press conference: When Detroit won their championship they lost their first game, I think pretty badly against L.A. They haven’t lost two in a row (this season) very often. They’re going to come and be ready to go and we need to match that intensity.

Question: Was last night the best you have seen this team play?
Powell: We’ve had a couple of good performances here in the playoffs. Obviously, we are happy with the way we played. But we know we have to come out and be ready to go again.

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