Postgame Quotes
Chattanooga 68, Furman 60
Greenville, S.C. | North Greenville University
Saturday, February 1, 2025
 
Deandra Schirmer, head coach
Opening statement
"I think me being the perfectionist I am, I'm always dissecting and that game shouldn't have been that close. We should have done this or that right after the game. I'm thinking all those things. But a wise man once said, my mentor Paul Honsinger, he said, 'Sometimes you gotta get a win and get the hell out,' and that's what it felt like tonight. For those of you at home, it was a Cracker Jack box gym. When it's packed it makes one person sound like 50, so when there's 50 in here it sounds like 1000s and 1000s. For our team pressed the entirety of the fourth quarter and be able to come out on top, I just thought that that shows the composure that we have. Credit to Furman for coming back. I think they hit some big shots to come back and I think they made some big plays to come back. I feel like our group is starting to understand that we don't need to win pretty. I'm a big football fan, but I think to the Kansas City Chiefs. With my Chiefs this year, it hasn't been pretty, but we don't need to win pretty if they buy into that. And I think the other thing that I'm really proud of is our group down the stretch, they went into that zone and they really kind of hurt us. We had two back-to-back, huge shots. Gianna [Corbitt] went in and finished, and then Sigrun [Olafsdottir] hit probably the nail in the coffin. I mean, excellent job by her. And then down the stretch, I ran out of timeouts, and veteran move, we went into our four to throw it up over top, understanding Caia [Elisaldez], and that's just where we're getting to the point where we've almost seen it all. The girls are learning in all the different situations. I do wish down the stretch, we've got to do a better job of not fouling and give them three-point plays and that's something that we're going to review. That's something that we're going to look at. But I do feel like this group is special. I'd be remiss if I didn't bring up the fact that Takia Davis and Jade [Moore] barely played any minutes. She went in there and she did her job. She set a screen for Caia to get open, and I really feel like this group is locked in and ready to go. I'm excited about this second half of season."
 
On the play of Caia Elisaldez
"Caia did an excellent job. We tell Caia all the time, 'don't play percentages in your head. If somebody's open, hit them and they're going to hit the shot.' I think that she was unguardable tonight. 24 points, five assists, six fouls drawn. Her plus/minus was at eight. I mean, fantastic job for her. I think that she's settling into that dominant role, and I think teams are going to have to figure something else out because she's been just so dominant for us the last couple games. I just feel like the maturity of Caia, we're seeing a superstar right now."
 
On hitting the big shots and playing strong down the stretch
"Sigrun [Olafsdottir] had five steals, and then went six-for-six from the line. Those are things where it's just like every point matters, and when we're looking at it, and we were 17-of-20, they were 16-of-19 [from the free throw line]. That's important. Those are big shots. We have lost some games because we haven't hit some big shots and some big free throws. Really proud of this group and really proud of their composure down the stretch. That's one thing that we're learning as a coaching staff, is that our group is so intelligent. They're absorbing everything that we're throwing at them, and just really proud of this group and what they're doing."


Caia Elisaldez, So., G
On the team getting the tough win
"I think, as I was talking last week in the press conference about G [Gianna Corbit] and how she's a dog; we've got a team of dogs, I think everyone had to pull it out. Everyone had to work hard today, no matter how many minutes you played, no matter how much you scored, everyone contributed to this and we gave our all on that court. That's exactly why we came up the way we did."
 
On playing a strong defense against the SoCon
"We knew coming into this game, we knew coming into all the games in the SoCon, that we would pride ourselves on our defense. We know our defense is something that is going to help us and it's going to carry us through day in and day out, no matter if we're hitting shots or not, and that's what we did today. We weren't completely hitting the way we wanted to, I don't think in any quarter if we're being completely honest, but we knew what we had to do defensively. We made sure we knew every one of their sets, every one of the coverages that we had to do, and we went out there and we executed. I was so proud of our team on both ends, but defensively, we held it down. Even if we didn't get some of the calls we wanted offensively, we went back down and we would get a stop on defense, the exact way we needed to."