After the UGA women’s basketball team defeated North Carolina A&T 72-54 on Wednesday night at Stegeman Coliseum, Georgia head coach Joni Taylor, along with redshirt junior Jenna Staiti, talk about the game and the win

Redshirt Junior Jenna Staiti (No. 14)

On her minutes played…

“I feel good, I just think that my conditioning and everything I have done in the offseason is really paying off. Our strength and conditioning coaches did a really good job of getting us into shape.”

On her double-double…

“I think that I have been practicing a lot better and it’s starting to show up in games. I think my biggest issue last year was that I wasn’t practicing well, and it just wasn’t translating into games. I’ve learned that if I practice really well it normally translates well into games.”

On her confidence on the court…

“We had a conversation about how I was not where I needed to be at the beginning of this summer. I was not where I am now, and the biggest change is that I have been talking throughout practice and giving lots of energy. I think it just gives me more energy when I’m trying to contribute to the whole team instead of throwing a pity party for myself.”

On her defense…

“If I continue to play defense without fouling, I really do think I can be a huge presence for this team.”

UGA WBB Head Coach Joni Taylor

On any concerns with the team’s performance …

“Yes and no. We started out really well, like last week too. I’ll take some of that (responsibility), we subbed a lot in the second quarter, we are trying to get Malury [Bates] in, Chloe [Chapman] in, and Javyn [Nicholson] some minutes… That’s the second week in a row that we’ve done it. It’s got to stop. I shouldn’t have to call a timeout because we are throwing the ball all over the gym and being careless and carefree of what we are doing on both ends of the floor. So, some of it is me, trying to sub and get some people in there and look at different combinations and if you look in the third and fourth quarter, I didn’t do that. We stuck with our four-guard rotation and our three post rotation and until they can go in and be productive and do what they are supposed to do, that is what it is going to look like.”

On redshirt-junior Jenna Staiti’s performance…

“Absolutely. Jenna’s been great. Credit to her, we’ve been on her and we are going to continue to stay on her because I still think she’s got more in her. When she came here she said she wanted to be great, and as long as that is her goal, we are going to challenge her that way. I think the shift for her is that at the beginning of the summer, she looked like she did last year. In terms of just being there at practice. She wasn’t doing anything wrong but I told her I hope you don’t think you are going to start. Starters look a different way, talk a different way, and act a different way. That is the only conversation we needed to have and she’s been different ever since.”

On Malury Bates …

“She’s just got to calm down. She puts so much pressure on herself. She feels like she has missed two years of basketball and she has, but she’s gotten one year back. So, she still has three to play. She has these goals and I’m glad she does and she’s capable of it from an offensive standpoint and her athletic ability but she puts a lot of pressure on herself to go out there and be perfect and that’s just not going to happen. She hasn’t logged the miles to play that kind of game and not that she’s comparing but to look like Jenna or Steph, so she’s got to settle in. Like I tell her, if you run the floor and rebound, the rest will come to you so she’s got to get her settled a little bit and not put such a high expectation on herself.”

On the turnovers…

“I don’t want them to get used to thinking we can buckle down and get ourselves out of it, because our schedule isn’t going to allow us to have these type of mistakes to happen and that’s to come out with a win, starting Sunday. Even tonight how North Carolina A&T played and got more looks and started turning us over. We just can’t allow teams to hang around. Part of that is on me with the subbing, but we got to make sure we are taking care of the basketball and executing the offensive and defensive game plan.”