Monday Cardinal Couple:
-A look at the Pitt Stats.
-From the post game press conference.
The Cards did enough to win late against Pittsburgh on Sunday afternoon in the KFC YUM Center, staging an inspired late second half rally to outscore Pitt 26-9 over the final 5:49. Here's some of the things that led to the Cardinal win:
Louisville shot 50% for the game (28-56)...going 15-26 in the second half for 57.7% against the tenacious Pitt defense. Free throw shooting was also a big key for Louisville (18-23), especially in the final twenty minutes. The Lady Cards went 14-16 in the second half (87.5%)...led by Monique Reid's 9-11 second half proficiency. Becky Burke and Keisha Hines were both 2-2 in the second half and the final seven points for Louisville came from the foul line. Pitt actually tried four more attempts from the field during the game (23-60) and ended up at 38.3%.
The Panthers were 15-22 on free throws.
Neither team exactly torched the 3-point attempts...Louisville going a dismal 5-19 (26.3%) for the game and Pitt not much better with 7-24 (29.2%) shooting from beyond the arc. Three Cardinals cashed in on trifectas...Antonita Slaughter (2-2), Shoni Schimmel (2-9) and Becky Burke (1-5). Tia Gibbs was the only other Cardinal to test the distance (0-3). The Panthers were led by Shayla Scott from 3-point range (4-7) and Taneisha Harrison (3-8) was the only other Panther to hit from deep. Jania Sims (0-6) was one of four other Panthers who tried but failed from beyond the line.
The Cards had 13 steals in the game, compared to Pitt's 9. Both Gibbs and Reid led Louisville with three each. Louisville had 18 turnovers for 40 minutes (Schimmel 9) and Pitt coughed it up 24 times (three players with six each). Louisville did have 52 deflections in the game...Schimmel getting 10...and both teams had 13 assists...Schimmel with seven for the Lady Cards. The Cards blocked four shots, Pitt just one.
Louisville lost the battle of the boards 38-33 to Pitt but had 21 defensive rebounds (Hines 5) compared to 19 for Pitt. Louisville did narrowly out-rebound Pitt in the final half 17-16. Hines grabbed seven boards to lead Louisville and Reid, Gibbs and Slaughter snared five each. Pitt was led by Shayla Scott's 11 grabs and Chelsea Cole's 10.
The Cards outscored Pitt 36-30 in the paint and got 25 points off turnovers beating Pitt by two there. Louisville also led on fast break points 10-4. Pitt dominated the 2nd chance point stat 21-8 and their bench outscored Louisville's 11-10. Slaughter was the game's leading scorer off the bench with eight.
10 players saw action for each team. Louisville got 38 minutes from Reid, 37 from Gibbs, 35 from Schimmel and 29 from Becky Burke. Hines saw 23 minutes and Charmaine Tay logged 14 minutes in relief. Slaughter got 11, Sherrone Vails eight, Asia Taylor three and Shelby Harper two. For Pitt, Shayla Scott played 39 minutes and Jania Sims 38.
Four Louisville freshmen totalled 25 points and 10 rebounds. They went a combined 9 for 20 from the field and 3-6 from the line. They did sink four out of Louisville's five 3-point makes but committed 10 of the 18 turnovers.
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From the Post Game Presser:
Monique Reid on the win:
"It was a really big win. We kinda of hung our heads a little bit when we were down because we've been 2-0 so far in the BIG EAST in pretty much blowout games...but today was really challenging. Coach gave us confidence and we got players like Nita (Antonita Slaughter) that broke thru with big shots. How big were those shots? Huge! I'm talking about she didn't even run the play...the play was a cut all the way thru...and I'm like...'Nita, NO!' but she was like really wide open so I just pinned the girl and she knocked it down. Then she came down with confidence again and knocked down another one. I was real proud of her...she stepped up big tonight. HUGE!"
Antonita Slaughter on her game:
" My team definitely gave me confidence. They tell me every day to start shooting more. After I knocked down the first one, I just knew I could hit the second one."
Reid on Pitt:
"They're a really long team. There's a couple of short players...like their point guard and '2" but from the three up they were really tough. They're a really good team and they're solid. This game really gave us a lot of confidence on our rebounding...we knew that if we boxed out, we'd win. We didn't box out all the time but when it was most important, we did. I felt like we did a really good job...the best we could on the boards."
Slaughter on early playing time against Pitt after no playing time against St. John's:
"My teammates give me the confidence and not playing just makes me realize that I have to work harder in practice so when I get on the court Coach knows what I can do."
Reid on her 'payback list' this year for teams from last year:
"Oh, yeah...we're checking them off. We've checked off three so far. We're looking to do some more. I'm just really proud of this team. Last year was a really sad year. It hurt my confidence a lot. I'm just glad Coach Walz recruited some great players that can step up. I was real proud of Nita tonight and I feel this game will give her the confidence to come in and make more big shots. We believe in her and I think all of our freshmen are doing good. I like it that if one player is struggling another person can pick them up."
Reid on Shoni Schimmel:
"The thing is with Shoni...she can miss eight in a row and then come down from half court and I'll be fine...because I know it's going to go in. Shoni's just an amazing player. She can shoot from deep. I trust her to take big shots. She has the floor. She did get a little frustrated tonight but she didn't let it get the best of her, composed herself and kept playing."
Reid on next week:
"Really every game is a big game in the BIG EAST. People are knocking each other off left and right and we can't look past Notre Dame for Connecticut. We have to play hard each game and play our game. We can't play next week like we did today...because we snuck out of this. I feel like we'll just have to come back to practice, work on what we need to work on, watch film and the only way to go is up. We can't give in just because of a name..."
JEFF WALZ
On Slaughter:
"I put her in the game because we couldn't hit the broad side of a barn from deep and she shoots the ball well. We did a good job of finding her...she hits the first three , which was a nice shot and her second one was from pretty deep. She did a great job and she did a great job in the first half also. Came up with a big offensive rebound and finished. She played a really solid game and I was really proud of her."
On Reid:
"She's starting to figure some things out. I'm really excited for her. What she needs to do is continue to work that hard every game. Defensively, she's getting better. There's still three or four minutes...when you watch film...and you're like 'what happened here?' ...and she's like 'I don't know, Coach..' but it's getting there. Those amounts of minutes are less and less. That's why she's able to go out there and play for 38 minutes."
On Pitt:
"They rebound the ball extremely well. We're not doing a very good job of boxing out. This is their first loss to a team that they out-rebounded. They're 0-6 when they've been out-rebounded. They were 8-0 when they've out-rebounded an opponent. We're very fortunate to come out with a win today
On the three point shooting:
"It was ugly. We had good shots. I really don't think we took too many bad threes. Threes in transition, threes that were kicked out...we had some open looks. Shoni hit a big one there...and Antonita of course makes her two in a row. One of the big plays though was when Tia Gibbs had a three point chance from in front of our bench, caught a shot fake and put it on the ground for a dribble pull up. It was a big basket for us."
On looking ahead to the upcoming week:
"I'd prefer not. (Laughs). We've got a week in front of us. Two tough road games. I told the kids in the circle there at half court after the game...if we play like we played today...there's not much hope. I thought at times...we hung our heads. I thought at times...we pouted. It wasn't just one player...it was four or five. We let all the emotions of the game take control of us and that's something you can't do if you want to become great players and win big time games."
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