Women's Basketball tops Oklahoma State, 63-56
Jan. 22, 2011
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AUSTIN, Texas - The Texas Women's Basketball team claimed its first Big 12 Conference victory of the season in a 63-56 win over Oklahoma State on Saturday evening in front of 4,835 fans at the Frank Erwin Center. The Longhorns improved to 12-7 overall and 1-4 in conference play, while the Cowgirls fell to 15-5 and 1-4. After hitting just one of its first eight shots, Chassidy Fussell got Texas going with eight-straight points to fuel a 12-3 run. After their slow start, the Longhorns hit nine of their next 13 shots to build a 24-11 lead. First-half turnovers plagued the Cowgirls with OSU committing 13 miscues through the game's first 12 minutes and 18 in the period. The Longhorns took advantage of the Cowgirl errors, scoring 24 of their 33 points in the half off those turnovers and led 33-22 at the break. For the game, OSU finished with a season-high 26 turnovers. In the second half, Oklahoma State freshman Tiffany Bias drilled a 3-pointer to cut the deficit to 40-34, Texas answered with seven consecutive points, including five from Fussell, to push the margin back into double digits. OSU used a 12-3 run to cut the margin to 50-46 with six minutes remaining before the Longhorns answered with eight of the game's next nine points. The Cowgirls refused to fold, scoring seven straight to get within 58-54 with a minute remaining but could get no closer. Fussell led all scorers with 21 points, while Toni Young paced the Cowgirls with 14 points.
POST-GAME NOTES TEAM
TEXAS QUOTES HEAD COACH Gail Goestenkors Opening statement: We're just really happy to come away with a win. I know it wasn't pretty and probably not the way we would have liked to finish the game, but overall I think we're just glad to get one under our belts and move forward and build on this. I thought our defense, particularly in the first half, was exceptional. I think we had 10 steals and about 24 points off of those steals, so I think we really set the tone with our defense in the first half and just really attacked the basket. Overall, I'm pleased and it's just something for us to build on. On forcing 26 Oklahoma State turnovers: I think it was a combination. I'm sure they are disappointed with 26 turnovers. We were switching a lot and getting open in passing lanes, so we gave them some different looks defensively and I think people that they were used to being open weren't always open. So I think it was a combination of our pressure and they just weren't taking care of the ball like they normally do. SENIOR GUARD Kathleen Nash On Oklahoma State's second-half comeback: When they were coming back, I was just thinking that we don't want to let this happen again because we've had several games where we've had a lead and the other team has come back. We just focused on taking care of the ball and not having those turnovers and building on the lead. On the physical battle she withstood tonight: I think we were expecting them to play zone and they came out with a little more man-to-man than we thought. It was just really physical, we had to battle the whole time to get open. When they were making that big run we just needed to focus on going to the basket, because some of our shots weren't going in from the outside and attacking is always kind of our go-to. FRESHMAN GUARD Chassidy Fussell On getting a Big 12 win : It feels pretty good, but I feel like we could have won more games than we have. So we still have to pick it up in practice and rebound and get our defense better. JUNIOR GUARD Yvonne Anderson On battling back during Oklahoma State's second-half comeback: I honestly wasn't panicking. We've been in those situations and it's about time that we have a different outcome. I just knew that if we attack and do the things we've been doing in practice and in our earlier games that ended up successful, good things would happen and we ended up doing it. OKLAHOMA STATE QUOTES HEAD COACH KURT BUDKE On the game: I thought it was a great game. I thought you saw two teams that had both been struggling a little bit come out and give everything they had today. I think both teams wanted it really bad and I'm really proud of my team. I know Gail [Goestenkors] is proud of her team for finishing. What I reminded my team of is there's going to be a lot of people that come to this place and lose. Nobody has had a tougher first four-game schedule than Gail and I. Our team, if you look at who we played, obviously we played some of the best in this conference so we have to come off this and we have to keep our heads up and keep battling and trusting each other and move forward because there's a long way to go in this league. I think my team tonight, even in a loss, took a little bit of a step tonight. I'm very proud of our kids. On the turnovers: I think Texas did a great job defensively, showed us some looks that we hadn't really seen. We have a couple of freshman point guards out there and we chose to go this way this year and go with youth and they just have to live through those things. We'll watch tape together and see what we could have done better as a team and what I could have done better as a coach. I think there's no question that that was the difference in the game. I think they had 31 points off of our turnovers and you don't have to look any further than that. SOPHOMOMRE POST TONI YOUNG
On the team's effort: The whole game we were all cheering for each other. Even when we were down we were still fighting for each other. We kept everything positive, listened to our coach and after we did something positive or negative we kept each other's heads up.
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