It was time to step up, buckle down and win the game, and the girls did that.

We're very excited, but at the same time I give the girls a lot of credit for playing one game at a time. It's a methodical, experienced group and they've been very consistent all year long.

I think the difference between this time and last time (two years ago) is the girls were just happy to be there and all that. We have nine players that were on that team that went two years ago and I think this year they want to do a little bit more than just say they went to the national tournament. They just want to be successful and try to win as many games as we can.

The girls were ready to play. This is the third time we've played Freeman.

(Free State was) the last team that we lost to and, after that loss, it made us better, and we're hoping for the same type of response out of the girls. I know this group of young ladies, and they will take this as a challenge to channel it in the right direction and get better.

We just couldn't stop the bleeding. We've not had a bad inning, and we had a bad inning. In softball, you just can't allow that to happen.