Lady Vols basketball is entering its final stretch of out-of-conference play. Tennessee is fresh off a two-game trip to California and has just a few games remaining before starting its SEC slate.
To preview this stretch, Lady Vols head coach Kim Caldwell met with the media. She was asked about the press breaking down, the trip to California, the play of freshmen and more.
Here’s what she said.
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On the most important thing she learned from the trip to California, losing to UCLA
“I think that that was a game where you go back and you watch the tape of, were they better than us? Without a doubt. Were they that much better than us? I don’t think so. I think we beat ourselves down the stretch. You cut it to 10 with eight minutes to go in the fourth, and then we lost it. Now, do I think we would have won the game? No. But do I think it needed to be a 22-point blowout on the road? No. I think we could have had it maybe an 8-to-12 point game.
“And we watched the film, we watched those points, it was really turnover heavy, and they were turnovers that were in really bad times, and they scored off of all of them. So just watching that, learning from that, I think our turnovers were better in the next game, our defense was better in the next game. So a pretty quick response and turnaround on the road, which was a pretty big trip for our freshmen. It’s a hard trip for anyone when you’re gone across the country in a different time zone for a week. So for them to be able to respond, second game still wasn’t pretty, but I do think it was better than the first.”
On if it was even more important to respond with a win at Stanford
“Yeah and you just want the quality of a trip home to be better, you have a long week of practice. You want it to be better and ideally, it worked out in a great way as a coach. If it was a close game, it was still an ugly game, we have a lot we can learn from it, but we still came away with a win.”
On what she’s seen from practice this week
“We’ve practiced hard, and I think that I’m very hopeful that our transition offense starts to look better, that our shots start to go in, that we’re playing with a little more pop, a little more juice on both ends.”
On what she likes about the mental confidence of the team
“I think a lot of individual players have gotten better. I’ve seen our skillset improve. Nya is continuing to improve, Jaida, Alyssa, Deniya, Mia, our freshmen. They are all taking a step in this week. Coop has looked better, Zee has looked better. When you see that, you see the majority of your team individually get a little bit better, that obviously makes practices more enjoyable to come to. Whenever you have a long stretch, school is now out, it can be kind of long days with them. But I think they’ve done pretty well on the hard days.”
On why she doesn’t think the team is a good third-quarter team
“I think consistency is something that we are still struggling with. Stacking days, putting days together, or being consistent throughout an entire practice. Our last practice for example, I was standing there, I was like wow, this has been great. We’ve had a really good practice. Then we lose it. So just keeping the pace, keeping the tempo, keeping the sense of urgency for an entire practice and an entire game.”
On what she doesn’t like about how her team has played in the third-quarter
“I don’t know how many third quarters we have won. I think we do a good job of addressing what we need to at halftime then getting back out, even when we take the floor at halftime, make sure we’re efficient in what we do. We are efficient in getting warmed back up and locked back in.”
On the UCLA game being beneficial for freshmen
“When you go and play in that environment on the road, when you play at South Carolina, it’s not as daunting. When you go to LSU, when you go to Texas, when you go to these tough environments and physical games with large crowds, it’s not so loud or the first time they’ve ever seen that. That’s really what we’re trying to get them.”
On Mia Pauldo settling in vs. Stanford
“She’s been really good. Her turnover numbers have been great. She was hitting shots, she was playing with confidence, she’s been really good in practice every since, so hopefully that was a good momentum builder for her.”
On how she approaches balancing taking threes and getting to the rim
“That’s really hard because I do think it’s getting better. It’s not translating on paper. The game it did translate on paper, the game we had our best shooting percentage, we lost by 22. So that’s really tough to look at as a coach. And then you watch other games, you watch some of our games, our shots are open. And yes, maybe they’re open because it’s on the scout not to guard them, but we’re taking shots that in our offense are open. So just continuing to learn with the pace and the flow and the shot clock.
“We do want to get downhill more. We have been very transition-heavy and we should be getting more layups. We should be getting more layups at the rim, we should have more advantage situations because we are pressing, we have those. We need to be putting our head down and getting to the rim or putting our head down and getting a dump-down pass. That’s non-existent in our offense right now. I think once you do that and you see the ball go in, everyone plays a little more (relaxed). Our Stanford shooting percentage was really bad, UCLA was really good, we just have to continue to be consistent.”
On how she can get the 3-point percentage up
“You have to go with the flow of the team. Nya is a really good example. She was shooting about 20-something percent, then she makes 10 threes in a game. Sometimes they need to see it click, sometimes they need their confidence built, sometimes it just takes time shooting the ball quickly, sometimes it takes time knowing, hey, I’m not shooting the ball very well right now or I am tired or this person that is standing next to me who is wide open just hit two, and getting in the flow of that. I think they are getting that. When we watch film, they can articulate that to me.”
On how she would like to finish the month
“We don’t want to lose. We talk about that. We want to go undefeated in December. That’s easier said than done, but we need to stack some wins together going into SEC play. The biggest thing for me is transition offense, seeing, getting some easier ones. Getting some layups. Not just shooting threes when we have one-on-one layups. Just because it’s a one-on-one and it’s a harder shot, we have the skillset to take it. And we do have the skillset to take it and right now I still think we have some moments when we’re settling.”
On if she liked the break between games
“I think we needed it. I think the last time we had a break, we looked better when we went to Middle Tennessee, so I think we have needed it. I like it, they hate it.”
On her concern level with free-throw shooting, why it has been bad
“Fatigue. I think when we are hitting shots and playing well, they’re going in. And when the balls not going in the hole, the ball is not going in the hole. That’s kind of been the base and that has to be with something with the way we are – the pace of play and slowing down to shoot a foul shot. It’s not something we ignore, it’s not something we don’t work on, it’s, hey, you’re here, you put the reps in, have the confidence to hit it.”
On if she wants her guards to get to the line more
“I do. I want Jaida to get to the line more. I want Mia to get to the line more, I think she can. Coop does a pretty good job, but I think she should be No. 1. I haven’t looked at the stats to see who is getting there the most, but Coop should be getting there the most.” (Cooper is third in free throws attempted behind Barker and Spearman)
On if she likes the assist numbers
“It’s hard. I think we’re sharing the ball better, I don’t think the ball is going in. We have a lot of film where we say, hey, this was the right pass, then we air ball it. Hey, this is the right play, then we air ball it. We have those. I do think they’re sharing the ball much better than they were earlier in the year. I think they’re not necessarily translating to assists because the shots aren’t going in. We want that number to be around 15, I don’t know what we’re at now. I think last time I checked it was 13, maybe 12, 13, we want it to go up. Again, when you start hitting shots, a lot of it takes care of itself and I think we’re close.”
On what stands out about Winthrop
“They’re off to the best start that they’ve ever been. I think we need to focus on us. We have one more day where we focus on us and then we’ll get into our scout. That’s been the really nice part about the break, we’ve had a lot of time of hey, we’re going to look at this, we’re going to look at this, we’re going to add this. Giving people some encouragement and building them up and then the next two days will be pretty scout heavy and then that’s kind of the routine we’ll be in of two days prep, day off, two days prep, then we’re in the thick of it.”
On a positive trend on film from the last two games
“I think sharing the ball has been better. I think we’ve been doing specific breakdown drills that you can see on the floor. We drive it, we kick it, we want one more. We drive it, we kick it, we swing it all the way around, multiple people have touched the ball. We had some really good at the end of that Stanford game of drives, then cut to the backside block. We’ve worked on that. We’re going to continue to get gapped and double-teamed until we all start hitting. We did a really good job of noticing our man went to double the ball-handler, then we cut. There are things that are translating and going the right direction.”
On what is different about Talaysia Cooper this season
“I think she is passing the ball a lot better than she did last year. She’s really being a willing passer, almost too much. Sometimes I want to say, hey, you need to put your head down in this scenario and go score. When she has the ball in her hands, she’s pass-first a lot of times, I didn’t see that out of her a lot last year. I would like her to put her head down and go a little bit more but I think that’s an improvement of her. She’s being more vocal. I think she’s taking a step in the right direction and she’s put some really good days together where hopefully we’ll see a new and improved version of her after this break.”
On why the press has resulted in easy baskets at times
“Rotations in the back. You can’t go if you don’t have pressure, but our back has been missing or stuck in between and we need to go all the way. If they score, they got to score quick. It’s got to be a contested pull-up and then go the other way. Our back rotation has done a better job in the break of rotating up. We’ve looked at a couple different options in our press, but top has been doing what they need to do. It just needs to be five people playing together.”
