[M T]

i was surprised too. Was expecting them to start fouling us. When she didn’t I got the feeling she was accepting the loss because she was not happy with her team’s performance and would rather this be a teaching moment as a loss that would t hurt their season vs have them survive last minute by fouling and not take to heart her lessons.

That was my impression as well.  Kim Mulkey knows how to stretch a game out, and she chose not to.  The foot stomp I referenced was at the end of the first quarter and appeared to be expressing her frustration with her team, not the refs or Stanford.

I'm NOT making light of the pain she must have with her back (I have a friend on an enormous amount of pain meds for the last decade or so for back issues), but if she's taking pain medication, that medication might affect her coaching style.  I've always thought of her as more intense than what I saw on Saturday.   As I said, I'm glad she's able to do more (squat & stomp) than what I saw in a game a couple of weeks earlier.

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Alanna is ESPNW Player of the Week: http://www.espn.com/womens-college-baske...anna-smith

I'm glad for that, but I agree with the sentiment that the game ball should go to Shannon (as the coaches aren't eligible).


I didn't watch closely enough to see whether it was Alanna that did the major work at shutting down Baylor's inside game on offense.  (Did we stop the passes into the bigs, or push them out of position, or be just a little faster, or what?)  I do remember seeing her body up one of their players and thought how she was doing a good job of it, and the refs weren't calling fouls possibly partly because she was not the big one of the matchup.

[M T]

i was surprised too. Was expecting them to start fouling us. When she didn’t I got the feeling she was accepting the loss because she was not happy with her team’s performance and would rather this be a teaching moment as a loss that would t hurt their season vs have them survive last minute by fouling and not take to heart her lessons.

That was my impression as well.  Kim Mulkey knows how to stretch a game out, and she chose not to.  The foot stomp I referenced was at the end of the first quarter and appeared to be expressing her frustration with her team, not the refs or Stanford.

I'm NOT making light of the pain she must have with her back (I have a friend on an enormous amount of pain meds for the last decade or so for back issues), but if she's taking pain medication, that medication might affect her coaching style.  I've always thought of her as more intense than what I saw on Saturday.   As I said, I'm glad she's able to do more (squat & stomp) than what I saw in a game a couple of weeks earlier.

---

Alanna is ESPNW Player of the Week: http://www.espn.com/womens-college-baske...anna-smith

I'm glad for that, but I agree with the sentiment that the game ball should go to Shannon (as the coaches aren't eligible).


I didn't watch closely enough to see whether it was Alanna that did the major work at shutting down Baylor's inside game on offense.  (Did we stop the passes into the bigs, or push them out of position, or be just a little faster, or what?)  I do remember seeing her body up one of their players and thought how she was doing a good job of it, and the refs weren't calling fouls possibly partly because she was not the big one of the matchup.