Transcript: Kim Mulkey's Final Four Media Telephone Conference

Baylor women’s basketball head coach Kim Mulkey joined a telenconference to discuss the first trip to the Final Four for the Lady Bears since 2012.

RICK NIXON: Good morning or good afternoon, depending on where you're at at the moment. Welcome to today's Women's Final Four head coach media teleconference. For the next 30 minutes you'll have the opportunity to visit with the head coach of the Baylor Bears, Kim Mulkey, seeking its third national championship in 2019.

Kim, if we could start with an opening statement.

KIM MULKEY: We are excited to head to Tampa. We've had a long night, got in at 1:30 this morning. We are going to regroup, repack, and looking forward to some sunshine.

RICK NIXON: We'll open it up for questions for Coach Mulkey.

Q. Was there a time during the season where you thought to yourself you may be good enough to get to Tampa and compete for the national championship?

KIM MULKEY: I can't tell you just one moment in time. I just watched our team from the loss at Stanford when we returned in January and we started playing in conference and we played Connecticut after Christmas that, you know, we knew we were pretty good. We knew that there was a lot of parity this year in women's basketball. We thought we had the talent.

What we didn't know is the next two or three months could we stay away from injuries, which has been a key problem for us the last several years late in the year, and how good are we. I couldn't tell you that until we really got into conference and just watched us play in the Big 12 and see the different coaches throw different things at us, how we handle ourselves.

Q. You've come into the Women's Final Four as the hunter and the hunted. Does it help knowing you came in before as the team to beat?

KIM MULKEY: I'm not sure we're the team to beat. I don't think we've been picked to win it. I know we're the No. 1 overall seed, but I'm not sure we're the hunted. I think we're one of four teams that can win it all.

We happen to be the overall No. 1 seed probably because of the timing of how losses happened late in the year. But we're just happy to get there, to bring players who have never been there, and realize Oregon is an unbelievably talented team.

I don't know that we're the hunted or the hunter.

Q. Going back to the one loss in season in December, you were calm going down the list of things that went wrong, talked about what you said was a lack of energy, communication, uncharacteristic play of your athletes. What has changed since then? Was your calmness a sign of confidence in your team or in California being Zen?

KIM MULKEY: I think any time you play non-conference games that far away right before your Christmas break, it's always a concern in scheduling. I think all coaches would like to play as many home games as possible. We knew that our team could handle whatever happened, and we needed to return to a game at Stanford. What better program to play against to gauge how good or how bad you are than to go against Stanford.

That game was not going to define our season or how good we were really, but it would give us a little bit of just kind of what we need to work on. Lauren Cox, I barely played her in the second half. I thought Stanford played extremely well. I thought they defended well, shot the three ball well.

I thought it was a game that gave our freshmen an opportunity. We were down when I took Lauren Cox off the floor, and the freshman post got to play a lot of minutes. We were down maybe 13, I can't remember exactly, 15, and they cut it to five. They got to grow up a little bit in that loss, as well.

Q. Any specific things that you worked on since then with your team?

KIM MULKEY: No, because I just thought some of the things I didn't like in that game was focus. I thought you had kids that were probably thinking about their plane trip back home for Christmas more than they were about what was taking place on that floor. That starts with me. Maybe I needed to do a better job in getting their attention.

It wasn't overemphasized. It was a game we flushed immediately after we got back from the holidays. We looked at the film, corrected things. You move on to the next game.

Q. Not many teams shoot the three as much as Oregon does. As the best rebounding and shot-blocking team in the country, how do you try to prevent a prolific perimeter shooting team from neutralizing your size advantage a bit?

KIM MULKEY: We actually have seen teams that shoot the three a lot. We see it in our league. We also have seen it because of our height advantage inside. We've seen teams change their approach when they play us that they do shoot more threes than they normally would. It's not going to be uncommon or uncomfortable for us to expect that and to see that.

Certainly we will defend like we always do with the understanding that you got to defend the three ball. We know what we face and how good they are from the three and how hard it is to defend them out there.

Q. Without giving away too much strategy, Stanford really made it a point to run their big in the Pac-12 tournament against Oregon, to stretch Ruthy, who was on a bad knee and still is. In your early impressions of Oregon, do you think you'll call on Kalani and Lauren to run in transition both offensively and defensively to try to put stress on her?

KIM MULKEY: We do that. If you've watched us play, you go, Wow, their bigs run the floor foul line to foul line, never stop. We bring in two athletic freshmen that do the same thing. It won't be because of what we need to do against Oregon. That's who we are. We're going to push the ball in transition. Those bigs get up and down the floor.

Q. You talked about it going into the Iowa game and afterwards about the narrative around Kalani, about your team, some tinges of disrespect. What do you attribute that to? Every team has things you nitpick, but it seems like this year you have kind of gotten the brunt end of that. Do you have a theory on why that might be?

KIM MULKEY: I don't feel like we've gotten any disrespect. I just feel like I'm going to defend my players. I think any parent, any coach in the country would defend their players. I think I have two of the finest post players in the country.

There are great players out there that are better than mine. I'm not going to allow other people, particularly media, to describe the weaknesses of my post players. They're not at practice every day. I know what I have. I know what they do. I know how good they are.

I don't look at it as anything other than somebody's opinion. I have an opinion, too. I see 'em every day. We don't feel slighted. We just speak from our hearts. Those kids are great players.

Q. Everyone talks about your size, the two post players. Everyone knows you rebound at a high rate. You ranked statistically in the upper 10 in the country in almost everything. Is there another area outside of low-post play and rebounding that maybe people aren't talking about?

KIM MULKEY: I think it's our defense. I think if you just look at field goal percentage defense, that has to be an area that doesn't get talked about very much because it's not pretty. Everybody wants to talk about the three ball. Everybody wants to talk about offensive stuff, how many points people are scoring.

I think our defense is special. I think it's at all positions that it's very good. Yes, we've scored a lot of points in these playoff games which we're very capable of doing. We don't know we're going to do that every night. I don't think any team can go and think how many points are we going to score.

Our approach is we know what we can do defensively.

Q. You mentioned you're one of four teams coming here to Tampa. If you play the way you've been playing, if you bring your A game here, is there a team that can beat you?

KIM MULKEY: Oh, heavens, yes. We're humble, man. There's four teams there that can win a national championship. We don't approach it like, Oh, wow, we're the No. 1 seed, we're supposed to win. According to a lot of people, we're not supposed to win.

We're going to fight. We're going to claw. We're going to compete. We're going to give it our best shot. I'm sure the other three teams are going to do the same thing.

Q. Coach Auriemma earlier said Notre Dame is the top team in the country. Is that bulletin board stuff or do you care?

KIM MULKEY: Oh, no. All we're thinking about is Oregon. We have got to focus on the next opponent. We don't even know if we'll be playing. Certainly if we are playing, we don't know if it will be Notre Dame. You just never know.

These four teams, guys, I'm telling you, any four of these teams can win it all.

Q. We were talking to Kelly Graves, him being the newcomer in the Final Four with coaches that have won multiple national championships. You've been there as an assistant, player. Can you reflect back to '05, the first time you went as a head coach, how different it feels? He said you have to win your first one first.

KIM MULKEY: It feels different in that you're experiencing something as a head coach for the first time. I was fortunate to experience it as an assistant and as a player. But honestly it doesn't feel that much different.

The big thing is when you've done it for the very first time, for these players that you take, they've never done it. It's their first time, period, in any capacity. It's fun to watch them. It's fun to watch their expressions, their excitement. That's what makes it fun for me now as a coach.

I have had the pleasure, I've been blessed to do it at all levels. My pleasure comes from watching those kids, taking my grandson, just watch all those happy faces. When it gets time to play, if I have a little experience, it may be calming them down, not letting them hyperventilate, you kind of say the right words.

It's fun when it's the very first time.

Q. You said this year how much fun this team has been to coach, the personalities. You talked about how a lot of it was how they were raised at home. When you look at this group, can you recall a group that's come together like this both on and off the floor?

KIM MULKEY: Can I recall a group that has?

Q. You've had good teams, but this has to stand out as a group that's come together personality-wise on and off the floor.

KIM MULKEY: It's like comparing children. I can't compare teams. I can't compare what this team is like compared to the '05 or the '12. They're all different. They all bring different elements to the table.

I just know you can just watch them, how they interact on the bench, when they mess up, how they help each other. They're pulling for each other. They don't get too high, too low. It's just a joy that you don't sit there and have to worry about pouty kids or kids that want more playing time. They all want to play, but they all understand the bigger picture. It's far more important than the individual.

Q. How early did you see that in this team, they would be that way?

KIM MULKEY: I saw it early. What I didn't see is could they sustain it or is this real, is this truly who they are, or do they work it, having good team chemistry.

This is who they are. They're funny in the heat of the moment. They'll say funny stuff to each other. They relax me. I'll be in a scouting report or getting on them at halftime or something, and one of them, not out of being disrespectful, but that's because who they are, they'll say, You tell 'em, Mulkey. Just funny comments like that. They're just easy to coach.

Q. Do you sense something different in Kalani this off-season that maybe you didn't see from her because she knew there was a lot riding on her final year here?

KIM MULKEY: No, because you don't want to put pressure on her. You acknowledge what's missing on her résumé. What was missing was a Final Four. She's got that now.

You never want to talk about it too much, but you bring it to her attention. Let's stay focused. When you're a senior, sometimes kids lose focus. There's nothing that a coach is going to really teach them. They know the system in and out. They know the workout habits. They know when we're going to do everything, how we're going to do it.

You have to have ways of motivating them. Sometimes you motivate them by making them mad at you. Sometimes texting them something. What does she mean? Keep them on their toes, keep them motivated. That's what I try to do mostly with Kalani.

Q. Is there something you did that was most effective in keeping her on her toes?

KIM MULKEY: I've done some things. I don't know at the time if she liked it. But I think she understood where I was coming from. Through a text challenging her to do a little extra work in the weight room, come to practice early, stay a little bit later. Just little things to where they know I'm not taking them for granted, I need a little bit more out of you.

Q. What players hear versus what coaches say. We're having this issue across a lot of different sports, coaches being accused of verbal abuse. As someone who played at the highest level, has coached at it, has that changed, and does it make it challenging for coaches to get their point across without it being taken wrong?

KIM MULKEY: That's a question that you and I could sit for hours. I would love to someday talk with you. I guess I can answer it like this:

Has our society changed? Has our society changed? When you said, I was a player, how I was coached, I thought it was the best. I thought it was the greatest. There was nothing harmful about a coach challenging you.

Yes, to answer your question, things have changed because I think back to some of the greatest coaches that coached me, the things that were done and said. They couldn't do it today because of what you just said. It's taken out of context or they're not allowed to any more or it's considered abuse or whatever.

So, yes. I guess your question is, Has it changed? Yes, it has changed. I just know my college years were the greatest years of my life. I played for intense coaches. I played for intense international coaches. I guess if they were still coaching, they would have to adapt because it has changed.

Q. Kelly Graves was saying he felt like he had to change some things. Have there been things you've had to change and adapt because of that?

KIM MULKEY: You know, I don't feel like I have changed. I feel like I have grown more mature and older with this generation. I have to attribute that honestly to my own two children. When you're going through coaching young people, you tend to be able to see your own children at those same ages in society, how we have discussions at home about things.

I think they have probably taught me what motivates the new generation. But what I'm so fortunate to do with my players is that when I go into a recruit's home, they know everything about me. What they don't know, I make sure they know. No coach is perfect. No coach is going to make all the right decisions through the course of the game.

If you have an understanding, and you have the best interest of those kids, then they will feel it. Now, they're not going to always like the decisions you make when it comes to playing time. Listen, that's the hardest part. But there's a difference in being perturbed at a coach over playing time than a coach that's not for you or a coach that may have made the wrong call on subbing you in or subbing you out.

I just know there's no better coaches that I played for than Leon Barmore and Pat Summitt. If I told some of the stories when they coached me, people would be astounded and go, Oh, my God. My response would be, Thank God.

Q. NaLyssa Smith, how has she adjusted to the college level? How much is this experience going to help her as she moves on into the future at Baylor?

KIM MULKEY: NaLyssa Smith is one of the best freshmen in the country. She is playing her best basketball right now. She is so unselfish. She understands the bigger picture. Like all freshmen, she hit that freshman wall a little bit during the season, during conference especially, because everybody knows everything about you when you get to conference play. She worked her way through it.

Man, she's special. Her talents are special. What a joy to coach.

Q. How do you think this is going to help her as she furthers her role there at Baylor?

KIM MULKEY: This is why she came to Baylor. I hugged her neck as she came off that floor last night. She hit critical buckets for us when I took Kalani Brown off the floor. She's done that for us all year. You can go back to the UConn game, the Arizona State game. NaLyssa steps in and is a tremendous offensive rebounder. She understands. She would see Kalani. She and Queen Egbo, they understand this stuff is valuable to us now.

They're like all competitors. Listen, they want to play more minutes and all that. They knew what was here when they got here. They knew they'd have to work for playing time. They knew they would be challenged, and their day would come. We are fortunate to have those kind of kids and that much talent in those kids to play at Baylor.

RICK NIXON: Kim, thanks for being with us. It's been a busy 24 hours. Safe travels. Look forward to seeing you here in Tampa.

KIM MULKEY: Thank you.