May 20, 2007
NCAA Regional
Columbia, South Carolina
South Carolina vs. Oregon Post Game Quotes
Championship Game – May 20, 2007
South Carolina Coach Joyce Compton
“The first game in a double elimination in Oregon’s situation, that’s a tough game to play for them because they always know they have a fall back. That’s kind of how they played. They came out knowing they had another game to play if things went poorly for them. For us, I felt we came out strong, but from the third inning on, I wasn’t really happy with our at-bats. The second game, they started to throw the same girl and from the first inning our kids hit hard and that’s always a pretty good sign.”
On pitcher Melissa Hendon:
“Melissa (Hendon) did a heck of a job both games. We started out the season saying we don’t want pitchers to have to win the game for us. We just want them to keep us in the ballgame. This team picked a great weekend to start hitting.”
“This team always felt they could win the whole weekend, and that’s how we came out. Early in the second game we did all we could to let them win it, but we eventually got the stops.”
“The crowd was unbelievable this weekend and that made it so much fun for the kids to play. That really helped us tremendously.”
“This year’s team was a team that, when we started the season we made the commitment that we’re going to change the culture of this team and get Carolina softball back to where it was in the past. We had six freshman and knew that three or four of them were going to play vital roles. Three of them did play big roles. It was a young group.”
“We’ve been close all year on games. If you look at our schedule, if we had 10 or 15 more hits, we’d have 10 or 15 more wins. They just kept plugging away and plugging away and eventually they just put it together at the right time. The postseason is the time to get hot.”
“The big thing is we’ve been playing well the past three weeks. Lisa’s been playing well the last three weeks. Ashton’s been up and down but she’s been turning it around the last few weeks. Melissa gutted it out two games and Kate gutted it out last night. Our pitching’s done a great job this year keeping us in ball games.”
Tori Martin
Regarding tripping while running home:
“I knew I’d hit that base about 40 times in practice so it was no big deal. I just took a little tumble. I knew my teammates would come through for me. I had faith in (Jessica Josker). I also knew that I blew a scoring run…I had the base, my footing just got too fast for me.”
Her thoughts on Jessica Josker’s game-winning RBI:
“I couldn’t make it home faster. I just tried to hit that home plate.”
Jessica Josker
Regarding teams walking McKenna Hughes three times this weekend:
“I love when people do stuff like that. I love being in that situation. I want to be that person; I love that pressure. When they walked McKenna it made me mad.”
“I think we were underestimated, but hopefully we’ll keep on surprising them.”
Ashton Payne
Regarding hitting against Oregon’s Kathy Arendsen:
“I had been seeing her really well. The whole weekend when I went up I felt confident that I could hit her. She pitched me inside and I love that pitch. I just pulled it and ran as fast I could until I got to third.”
“I don’t think they took us apart (in the first game). The first time we played them we had 12 hits. We hit her hard. We had our opportunities to take that first game we played against them, we just didn’t cash it. I felt fully confident coming into today that we could take two from them.”
McKenna Hughes
“Every senior and person wants to end their season with a win on their home field. We finished with Ole Miss and none of us ever thought we would get a regional at that point, but we finished today.”
“Just to walk out with a win on my final senior home game (is nice).”
Oregon Head Coach Kathy Arendsen
On the game:
“First of all I want to congratulate South Carolina on an amazing battle. They played great, were relentless, and they never got down during the game. We wish them the best of luck during the rest of the Super Regional. As a team, we are devastated. This is an amazing team, my favorite in 20 years of coaching. I’m proud of them, their effort, and the way we came back in the second game. Alicia Cook pitched her hear out. These kids did everything we asked them to and I’m very proud of them.”
On walking McKenna Hughes:
“That was one of the easiest decisions of the day. McKenna [Hughes] is their leading hitter. What happened though is that the kids behind her stepped up and that was huge. In this regional, a lot of people pitched to Jennifer Salling, which was surprising because no one in the Pac-10 did. By pitching to her, our number four and five hitters have to step up. McKenna did an excellent job of hitting the ball hard every time she stepped up to the plate. We didn’t want to walk her every time, but we didn’t want to pitch to her when the game was on the line with people on base. Obviously they figured out a way to score, the same way the did last night against North Carolina State.”
On getting McKenna Hughes in the sixth:
“For us that was a huge pick-me-up. Joanna Gail has caught line drives that could knock people over all year. To me it was positive when we got McKenna out. Our pitcher was running on fumes and I knew that, but she was telling me she could do it. I probably left her in one hitter too many, but at the same time you have to let her have her chance. She missed most of the conference season with an illness and came out today and pitched her heart out.”
On Jessica Josker:
“You have to give the kid credit. I had to look at the stats and take my chances, that’s the way softball goes. It burned us, the same way it burned NC State last night, but quite frankly I’d do it again and take my chances.”
