Jan. 9, 2011
Recap | Box Score | Notes | Russell’s Photos 
Vanderbilt Head Coach Melanie Balcomb
On the seniors Hannah Tuomi and Jence Rhoads…
“I think both seniors realize they have to close it, they have to step up, and they have to put people away. They understand that and we really don’t have anybody else on the floor that does understand and that has that experience. So they have to be willing to do that and what was fun was seeing both Hannah and Jence have that success.
On Vanderbilt’s lead…
“What got us the lead was how we started the game defensively. One of the things we were focused on was taking (Blanche) Alverson and (Alli) Smalley and holding them down and under their average because everything goes through them.”
On Jordan Coleman and Tiffany Clarke…
“We went back with Jordan (Coleman) which was one of the things (that helped us defensively). And Jordan won’t make the paper and get the credit in the media but inside our locker room Jordan got a lot of credit for what she did, Jordan and Tiff (Clarke). They had a lot to do with the game plan and stopping and slowing down Alverson and Smalley and containing them like we did.”
On Jasmine Lister’s rebounding…
“She’s scrappy and when you’re scrappy … she’ll get the six rebounds but at the same time somebody is tipping that ball out to her, she’s not going in there and grabbing that rebound. We work a lot on offensive rebounding and if you can’t get it, you tip it out to the guards so it’s kind of a play where we’re trying to do that and then kick it for three while they’re not set up.”
Senior Forward Hannah Tuomi
On realizing that she was perfect from the field during the first half…
“No, I wasn’t (aware). Jence (Rhoads) and I were just talking about it that there are quite a few things in the game that you don’t really realize until the end of the game. Things like rebounding. As a player, you are probably more focused on the mistakes.”
On her shooting success…
“Early on I was getting good position and they weren’t getting there in time to double (team). I saw it more so in the second half with Stephanie (Holzer) and me when they were passing it into the post. The opposing team – one of their players would come over and try to double or try to confuse us and that might have been the difference.”
Senior Guard Jence Rhoads
On closing out games as a senior…
“We are the ones who are going to be experienced and have to keep everyone’s pace down because we started to speed everything up and get flustered when Auburn was making its run. I thought we did a good job handling it but we had too many turnovers but other than that we did a good job keeping the lead and keeping them down.”
On time management…
“We try to run our plays through all the way to the end and we ran a little bit more of the clock than we usually do and pushed it in transition. Coach was calling longer plays that reverse the ball a couple of times and it really helped us settle down at the end of the game.”