Postgame Quotes
Chattanooga 53, Florida Gulf Coast 61
Fort Myers, Fla. | Alico Arena
Saturday, November 30, 2024
 
Head Coach Deandra Schirmer
On the team's effort
"I think we keep having these games where we play hard, but at the end of the day, whoever's hitting shots is going to win the game. I fell like we're putting ourselves in position to get good looks at the basket and we're just not hitting. I think that the field goal percentage is a little bit deceptive at 45 percent because we had 17 turnovers and a lot of those turnovers were travels. We're just out of control. We're trying to be aggressive, but we've got to be able to make plays. I think we're getting the matchups we want inside and then we're unable to finish. They're getting a jump ball or we're traveling.
 
"My thing is, in a learning process, in a team right now that we've got, we're trying to learn and build and grow. Offense is a big confidence boost. When you're not hitting shots, a lot of times you can have the frustration fouls that we've had. You can have a lot of that undisciplined stuff that comes in to play. I feel like that's what we saw in the first half. We're frustrated, we're not hitting stuff wide open offensively. So then we're fouling on the back end. I felt like in the second half, we did a good job of being disciplined on that. It's all a learning process. I feel like we've learned a lot of lessons so we're ready to start putting those to use.
 
"As a team and a program, we're hungry for a win. We're looking forward to the next game to kind of prove ourselves."
 
On opponent making plays
"I feel like they knocked down some big shots down the stretch. I do think that for us to be able to execute our zone, I was really proud of our group to be able to make that adjustment and hold them to eight points in the third quarter. But then in the fourth letting them get loose for a couple. It's got to be a complete game. Right now we're trying to find a way to play a complete game. We've got to get more experience with a deeper bench. As a coach, I've got to do more substitutions, even though it's terrifying sometimes because there's a drastic difference in productivity, but we've got to be able to get people down. Those are things we're learning as a group. We were able to pull off the miracle against Lipscomb but tonight it didn't work. We've got to find a way to put our players in a better position."
 
On playing with a shallow bench
"We got outplayed tonight from an offensive standpoint, and that keeps happening. I thought Penn outplayed us from an offensive standpoint. So as a coaching staff we've got to look at that. We've got to score more than 53 points and we've got to find ways to do it. I feel like we found little pockets. We found ways to get Caia [Elisaldez] some looks. We've got to do a better job of finding some other things we can do, that we can score in. I feel like down the stretch we're trying to manufacture points from the bench, getting them in to set plays, and then when you get a wide open look and we over pivot and travel or get a jump ball, they just need more experience."