TUCSON – Arizona returned home for the first time since its 66-59 win over in-state rival ASU. The Wildcats fell earlier in the week to No. 20 Oklahoma State, where they lost Jada Williams and Mailien Rolf to injuries. Short-handed against the Horned Frogs, Arizona played well through three quarters, keeping it close against one of the nation’s premier teams that features Hailey Van Lith, Sedona Prince, and Madi Conner. But in the end, it wasn’t enough, even with a career-high 30-point performance from sophomore guard Skylar Jones. Hear what Arizona head coach Adia Barnes and Skylar Jones had to say postgame following the 85-73 loss to No. 11 TCU.
Adia Barnes
Adia Barnes postgame on the fight she saw from Arizona against No. 11 TCU:
“The first thing I like to say is I thought our team fought really hard. I thought we played, like, probably almost 30 minutes of pretty good basketball, but we played a better team than us tonight, or today. I thought TCU, they’re really good. In my opinion, they are, like, at the bottom would be a Sweet 16 team. They should go further. I mean, they had a ton of experience, and I think Sedona, I think she needs to graduate. She’s been in school like, seven years, so, you know, they still have a lot of experience. And it really showed down the stretch in tough situations. They made mistakes. They made us pay for it.
So, I mean, Madi is a four and a half year player, you know, Hailey Van Lith, not only is a really good player, but she’s won at a lot of different schools, and she has so much experience. I coached her at USA basketball, and I coached Sedona at USA basketball. But they’re just – they have a good team. They have shooters, they have, you know, Sedona is a beast inside. And actually, I commend Mark, because he’s getting Sedona to play the best basketball I’ve seen her play ever. So, they’re just a really good team. So, congrats to them.”
Adia Barnes postgame on Arizona playing TCU without Jada Williams and Mailien Rolf:
“Yeah, I think not having Jada, who’s our primary – she’s our only point guard, and then having Paulina have to step in and play the one for 37 minutes, and we didn’t have a backup one today, very, very hard. I knew that was hard, but a lot of people step up and I want to challenge them. And then Mailien is one of our best defensive players. I mean her and Sky on the perimeter, and not having her really hurt us. Just to be able to kind of match up with Madi and to match up with Hailey Van Lith, so that was going to hurt us.
But I thought Lauryn and Paulina did a really good job. I thought Sky played out of her mind today. Couldn’t ask for anything more. I mean, Isis, with Breya in a little bit of foul trouble, Isis playing 39 minutes with the way we play, that’s a lot to ask of them. So I don’t, I don’t know what I could have asked for more. The only thing maybe Breya could have had night was she could have gave us 10 more points. But it’s just, we were very short handed. It’s not an excuse. And on top of that, Paulina was throwing up for four days and had IVs in the afternoon. So not an excuse.
I told her, ‘Hey. I said, you know, Michael Jordan played his best games when he had the flu, so let’s go. You know, she had IV, and I was like, Are you feeling good? I was like, there’s special stuff in the IV, it’s gonna make you feel way better.’ But she was given everything. I think one of the things in my mind is, Isis, Sky, Montaya, all of them hands on the knees, like in that fourth quarter in the beginning, and we still have 10 minutes. They did everything they can, I’m proud of them. And TCU is a better team, and they should be better. Way more experience, spend a lot more money, they should be a lot better.”
Adia Barnes on the team’s ability to learn and adjust quickly in the week for games:
“I’m also proud of this young team, because in the past, I told them in their postgame, a month ago, if we would put in like three quick hitters, usually I would put them in like three, four days, so you have time to prepare. I think that’s one of the differences in the way the Big 12 is too, because sometimes you don’t have like that week of preparation. It’s a little bit faster – there’s more time in between, like the two, but then usually we have, we’re used to having one – you do have like the whole week for the one, but then it was less time in between two on the weekend.
But you know, a month ago, if we would have put in a quick hitter and said, run this, like yesterday, because I didn’t know who’s gonna play, so we put like, two or three things against, like, small, easy things, we would not have been able to do it, and we did a great job. There’s three things I did specifically for against their personnel, to exploit their weaknesses, which work today, and they executed like perfectly. So that was an area of growth. So we’re getting better. We just have to get more consistent, get some of you to step up. We need to get Breya confident playing again, and we need to get Jada and Mailien healthy, which we will by next game. And then I think it would have been a different game.”
Adia Barnes on Madi Conner’s return to the McKale Center and Tucson:
“I have known Madi for a very long time. I recruited her when she was in eighth grade. So, you know, I think, I always want players to go be their best. If you look at our system, when Madi was here, we were a Final Four team. We played the national championship and lost by a basket. She wasn’t playing as a freshman. That’s normal. She wasn’t as good as she is now.
Now it’s much different, much better player, but I want people to have success. They’re kids and like, this is women’s basketball. I want our game to be great. I didn’t like her necessarily shooting. I said, ‘I don’t want to see you again,’ but I don’t have any hard feelings. There’s timing, there’s different situations that happen. And she’s now a four and a half year senior, so she should be a lot better. And for us, she would play more minutes now too. So, I just wish her the best. She’s a good person, with a good family. So great job.”
Adia Barnes postgame on her comfort with Paulina Paris as the primary ball-handler for Arizona against TCU:
“I was, and I have to be very honest with you guys, I was very worried coming into the game, because she hasn’t been able to hold down food for three and a half days, and so we gave her the IV, but then psychologically, that’s hard. She couldn’t hold down rice or Gatorade or anything. So I was nervous, to be honest, because going into this game, I know she needed to play 35-40 minutes, I knew maybe we could play her. We didn’t have another point guard, so putting Lauryn in was, or Montaya, I knew that was gonna be a struggle. So I was a little worried about it. I thought she did a phenomenal job. She gave everything she could. She was working her butt off.”
Skylar Jones
Skylar Jones postgame on Arizona wanting to prove folks wrong with a tough performance against TCU:
“We wanted to prove the country wrong with whoever we had, if we had Jada and Mailien, or even if we didn’t, because we knew, like we wouldn’t know if we would have them, so we wanted to do it for them, and we wanted to shock the country, to prove that we can hang with top tiers in the country. We’re a young team, but that’s not an excuse. And I think that we showed that we can hang with an experienced team as well.”
Skylar Jones on her career-high 30-point performance:
“Throughout the week, Coach Adia and the coaches were having me post up on the block, trying to teach me, like, my footwork to post up. So I was like, oh my god, I gotta do what Breya and Isis do, I gotta try and bang. And I actually enjoyed. It was really fun. It was easier for me to not get charges because I’m not moving. I’m kind of like, on balance. And I think I shoot better percentages when I’m on balance anyway. So I thought that was good. And then, I don’t know where my three shooting came from. I was just shooting the ball, but it was going in.”