BATON ROUGE — After a week between games, LSU head coach Sue Gunter previewed the Lady Tigers’ matchup with Georgia set for 2 p.m. on Sunday in the Maravich Assembly Center.
Quotes from Coach Sue Gunter
January 31, 2003
…On having a week off
“I think it was a much needed break. I think we needed some time, number one, for relief from the pressure. I think we needed Monday off, came back on Tuesday and Wednesday with really good practices and what we like to call clean up practices. We went back and did not even talk about Georgia at all. We worked on some of our half-court offense, defense, cleaning up our screens, man defense, and get our spacing better on our half-court offense. Just basic fundamentals that I think when you get in a long stretch of having to prepare specifically for a game every single practice, you do not do some of the things you need to work on, so I think the time away was very good. Really and truly it was not until Thursday that we started coming back and looking specifically towards Georgia. We just finished two thirds of our schedule. We’ve just finished 18 games and we have 9 more to go and that’s the critical part of our schedule. I think the timing for us was good, to be able to come in and have a little time off there before we start this last stretch. Because this last stretch for us is brutal, it’s unbelievable.”
…On this next three game stretch beginning with 18th ranked Georgia
“I think Georgia is playing the best and it’s kind of an agreement among the coaches that I’ve talked to in the conference. Georgia is probably playing better then anybody in the conference. However, Tennessee is playing really well right now too, but I think Georgia is playing extremely well. When you look at where we are right now, we had Vanderbilt at home then the week off. Then we are looking at Georgia and you think how important that is because you have to turn around and go to South Carolina and Mississippi State and their both ranked higher then Georgia and Vanderbilt. So, it’s just a critical time in our season and on the schedule and somehow we have to stay focused and try not to look beyond because you cannot look beyond. Georgia is about the only thing we can look at right now and hope to maintain some semblance of order because you cannot look ahead and breath.”
…On Georgia’s Twin Towers
“There about as good as it gets. That whole front line of theirs is really tough. We just got through playing (Chantelle) Anderson and (Jenni) Benningfield and we know how good they are. You look at (Christi) Thomas and (Kim) Braxton and they are every bit as big, in fact, Thomas is bigger then Benningfield. They are so very mobile, they get up and down the court and they both board well. It’s going to be tough but it may be to our advantage a little bit to have played Vanderbilt just before we play Georgia. Just the fact that we’ve had to defend two really big players.”