UC San Diego Head Coach Patti Gerckens-
On feeling going into the game..."I think we were just excited. Of course we are going to be nervous in any games that you start. I think the team felt prepared and were anxious to start."
On the 3 errors committed by your team..."It was very uncharacteristic of us to have errors and at this stage of the game it is going to be the team that makes the least amount of errors that is going to go on to win. We know that. We just got to play better."
On losing the first game..."It is a brand new year. We are up for the challenge. It will be a tougher road, a longer road but the road is still there and we can still finish first."
Dixie State Head Coach Randy Simkins-
On feeling going into the tournament..."I think we had great preparation our practices back in St. George and in our practices here yesterday."
On playing UC San Diego..."We knew it was going to be a tight game, we played san diego four or five times the last few years and they've always been good games, and with Camille throwing we knew we were not going to get a bunch because you know she isn't going to give up a lot of runs so we knew we had to take advantage of every opportunity we got."
On playing good defense while UCSD had 3 errors... "For us defensively we try not to give people four and five outs an inning, try to never give up back-to-back hits or back-to-back base runners. We work ourselves out of one jam it didn't work ourselves out of another one where we gave up a couple of back-to-back hits but we knew it was going to be like that, and every opportunity that we had to take advantage of a mistake. You have to right here against good teams."
On your pitchers performance..."What a great luxury to have Maddie (Snow) who's got to be a microscopic ERA just like Lauren Folta,they both have a low 2 ERA and we knew the third or fourth time through line up if you give 'em a different look with a very good pitcher and Maddie's a very good pitcher, you know come in and give her a little different view and movement on a ball. You get somebody the third time through the line up, they're going to have good swings you know. Lauren, she walked the leadoff hitter a couple of times and worked herself out one jam and didn't work herself out of another. But you know Maddie's been lights out for us lately and we knew she'd get it done and she did."
Cal State Monterey Bay Head Coach Andrea Kenney-
About player position changes..."Well I think that the substitution we made with Kylie coming in for Cori and moving Cori to second base really gave our team stability. Kylie was throwing well, she was throwing hard. The wind was a little bit of a challenge for Cori with all the spin she has on the ball. Bringing Kylie in was a nice move. It was a pick me up. And then coming out in the sixth inning and everything seemed to be falling our way. The wind was blowing nicely and Angelina Orozco drove a ball. They had a little bit more trouble with the wind than we would because we practice here. And that is the nice thing about getting the home field. So it really worked out well for us."
On ability to come back after early defecit..."We have carried John Wooden’s philosophy of not looking at the scoreboard. We have carried that all year. If we get behind, it doesn’t matter because it is how well we hit the ball. So we are just trying to play one pitch at a time. We don’t’ get down. We know that we can come back regardless of the score. We have done it all year. Cori did a great job at hitting the ball today. Orozco hit a home run, a slap stick homer."
On Reinhardt and Linnane combination..."They compliment each other. Kylie throws very hard and Cori has more junk. It is enough to give opponents fits. We worked our lineup creatively today and it worked out for us."
On Nina Villanueva's 16th Homer..."Nina’s (Villanueva) home run was big for a few reasons. First of all, we were losing. She brought us back into the game with a clutch home run. She just broke Shae Olds home run record here at CSUMB in her freshman year. That was a record that I thought I would not see fall for many, many years. Shae was a great hitter for us. Then at the same time, she tied the CCAA RBI record with that same home run. It is just fun to see your freshman do such great things."
Montana State-Billings Head Coach Lisa Allen-
On getting out to an early lead..."I think our girls really came out aggressive and they knew what they needed to do in the beginning of the game and I think in the fourth inning we kind of let up, maybe thought that we had the game and we got a little bit quiet."
On losing lead via Otter 5-run inning..."I think it’s like I said in the 4th inning, we kid of got quiet and I think we kid of that we had the game at that point. The team just let it get to them, I think we started to coast was the problem and our defense settled in rather then keeping the energy up like we had at the beginning of the game and staying tough as a team."
On playing the UCSD tomorrow..."UCSD is a great team just as all the other teams are in the top 8 but we knew but we knew that coming in that all the games that we play are going to be a battle and we look forward to playing them, it will be a great game tomorrow."
On playing conditions..."Playing in the GNAC helps a lot with the wind factor. A lot of the places we go are very windy and we normally have the rain to deal with as well so I think we should have been used to it but I think a little bit of it was also nerves and making plays in big key situations like I said we have a lot of really young girls that have never experienced postseason and coming out and playing in this type of atmosphere is difficult."
On fan support..."We’re really lucky as a team, we have a lot of fan support with out parents. There’s always something there whether it’s one or fifteen and I know we have about six families that came out and they’ve done a great job supporting us throughout the entire season.”
