Dec. 31, 2015
Wisconsin vs Indiana
Kohl Center

UW Head Coach Bobbie Kelsey
Opening Statement:
"We were very happy about this game. Obviously it's a close game, a lot of our games are going to be close. It's up to us to execute down the stretch and we did that. Got a couple O (offensive) boards and made some big shots. Nicole (Bauman) made a big one. Shelly's (Marble) three was huge, Mick's (Johnson) rebound on the other end, Rosie's (Gambino) two charges. I could go on and on about everybody. Avy's (Young) offensive rebound there at the end – that really helped us, those two rebounds because it took more time off the clock.

"We're just proud of a total team effort, everybody did their part. But we can do better, we can do a lot better and we know that but this was a good one to get, especially at home with a good crowd, football won last night. We want the Badger Nation to feel good about all our teams, so we wanted to do our part."

On the seven-player rotation:
"Well, you just have to play who's available. You can't be whining about who's not available, we have a rule, 'No whining, no complaining, no excuses.' That goes for coaches too, everybody. So we can't dwell on that. If you dwell on that, then you won't utilize who you have. We have enough to get the job done. Do we like playing Nicole 39 minutes? No, but she's up for the challenge, Dakota played a lot. But we're going to rest them more than some of the other ones and we just have to manage their minutes, manage their practice time. Sometimes mental rest is better than physical rest. It's going to be like this the whole year until we get people back and get healthy."
 
On Nicole Bauman's last minute 3-pointer:
"We told her, 'Don't hesitate.' I don't care if she misses 100 shots, I believe it's going in and I know she does too. Those times early in the year where she wasn't shooting, I'm like, 'Nicole, shoot the ball.'
 
On the team's nine total turnovers:
"We keep up with it, because that's been an Achilles heel for us. I heard someone say that there is a difference between confidence and belief. Confidence is there's just something in the air. Belief is that you've seen it before. So now that we've seen that we don't have to turn the ball over and when we don't that things can happen, now we can hold them accountable and they can hold themselves. You don't have to make turnovers, if you execute your offense and you know what you're looking for, you don't have to make crazy passes and crazy plays. You just have to execute, calm down, focus, and make the other team stop you.

"We're going to get some good looks if we run it correct. This tells us that we can do things the right way against a good team. Indiana is a good team. They've got shooters, they've got bigs, they've got a lot of weapons over there, but we just happened to be able to take away some of the things they were looking for and get a couple more possessions.

"Our games are going to be close. I hope we win by 20 or 30 but we don't have the bodies unless nobody's missing a shot, but you're going to miss some. We're just believing that we can get the job done and whatever the outcome is I just told them, 'Play hard, give maximum effort, and then the outcome will take care of itself.' At the least, you can feel good about your effort."

On playing zone defense and foul trouble:
"Our margin for error is slim to none. I asked Nicole how many fouls she had at half time and she said none so I'm like, 'Oh, good.' I told her, if she gets one she has to come out but we can't afford to have her out so she has to play smart. Avy's, that hurt us a little bit with her foul trouble. It's just being a little bit too aggressive, you have to know when to back it out. We love it, but sometimes it works against you if you don't know when to use it. Every time you see it, you can believe that you can make those adjustments.

"The zone did us right and then they adjusted, and so we had to adjust to them. Then we run those plays they beat us on in practice and see how we need to adjust. We're going to keep running that, with Sasha Palmer being from Syracuse, that's all they ran and she put in a lot of stuff that we did do before. I don't take credit for that zone, that's all her. I didn't understand some of it but it makes sense now."

 

Dakota Whyte
On the team's mentality when shorthanded:
"It makes everybody have to ratchet up every part of their game and making sure that we come out, we're effective, we're efficient. I think that we did that tonight, so it helped us mentally and physically."

On if this game will have a positive effect on the next:
"I think everything Nicole said was perfect. I think that this gives us the confidence like Coach Bobbie said, to know that actually can do it and we've seen it before, we believe that we can do it next game as well."

On making her last two free throws:
"I had a pretty bad free throw shooting day, but at the end of the day I'd do anything for my team. Mentally I just had to tell myself, 'You know what, this is for my team, this is for a win, this is for our first Big Ten win.' It means just as much as it would mean in a championship game. So I really had to mentally crack down and just make my free throws.



Nicole Bauman
On her 3-point shot with under a minute to play:
"I definitely noticed that she went under the screen, so then that opened up my three. I'm confident in my three, just as I am about my layup or my pull up, so right when she went under I knew I could shoot it."

On if this game will have a positive effect on the next:
"I think so. Like Coach Bobbie said, we didn't have that many players tonight but that didn't stop us. Everyone came out with the whole motto we have of 'No excuses.' If everyone just plays with the confidence we had, and we believe we can win, we can keep going."