Virginia Tech women's basketball head coach Kenny Brooks, sophomore guard Georgia Amoore and senior guard Kayana Traylor met with the media following the Hokies' 87-80 overtime win over fourth-seeded North Carolina in the quarterfinals of the 2022 ACC Tournament. Read some of what they had to say:
KENNY BROOKS
(Opening statement) I don't know if I have enough energy for opening statement, but I'll tell you what, I've never been prouder of a group of kids, the way they -- in the face of adversity, they never wavered.
A little bit over 24 hours ago, we walked into here and we were very healthy. And then whatever it is, 30 hours later, two of our main players are not with us, and we very well had reason to just say, you know what, we gave it a valiant effort. But they didn't. They regroup really quick. We had to get to halftime so we could make some adjustments and figure out how we were going to play the second half. And from that point on, they all believed. They all believed. They all stepped up. They played extremely well.
(On the chess match of switching things up) Well, it did catch us off guard a little bit (UNC playing zone). They were mixing up the defenses in the first half and they kind of went to the zone exclusively in the third. They may have played some man-to-man. But we had to just readjust.
I have play calls, and when you have a 6'6" All-American, probably 75 percent of them are geared towards her or play off of her. And with the group that we had out there, we kind of went to a different philosophy with spreading the floor a little bit more and trying to attack. And once we told them what we wanted -- you know, they attack a little bit differently when Liz is in the game and when she's not. And once they really got adjusted to playing that way -- and we saw some wrinkles in the game. We saw some things we wanted to exploit through their zone.
GEORGIA AMOORE
(On the and-one bucket in regulation) Yeah, the trust that Coach has in me to run that obviously speaks volumes. But I turned that corner -- I don't think I faked a hand-off. That lane was just wide open and I saw it and I took it and had all the trust that I was going to make it and draw the foul.
(On energy left) I mean, it's the tournament. It would be selfish of us to go out there and not give everything we've got. As to left in the tank, I've got plenty.
KAYANA TAYLOR
(On perseverance from the team) I think coming into the game we knew we all had to step up because we weren't going to have Cayla. And then when Liz went down, it just emphasized that even more. I think it goes to show our chemistry and our trust with each other and just wanting to really play for each other and play for our coaches.
(On the mentality down the stretch) Yeah, like I said, I think it was really we wanted to do it for each, we wanted to do it for Liz and Cayla, because obviously they wanted to be out there and couldn't. So we just wanted to make sure that we left everything out on the floor and didn't have any regrets. So I think that was the mindset and just getting through like every single possession.
