Everything Kellie Harper said at media day: "I love being around them. I love walking into practice every day with them."
The Missouri women’s basketball team held its preseason media day Tuesday. Here is video and a transcript of everything first-year coach Kellie Harper said.
Opening statement
Harper: “Well, first, I’m excited to see you guys here. Makes basketball season seem real. We’re really excited about the opportunity to get out on the court and play and get the season started. I do know there’s still some time. I’m still, listen, I’m still pulling really hard for our football team. I cheer about as loud as anybody at the games or at home. So, I know they’ve got a lot to do, but you know, a week from, a week from today, we’re tipping it up under the lights, and we’re excited.
“I think we’ve had a lot of growth as a program already. I think our team has been, they’ve given us a lot of energy. They’ve given us a lot of effort, and I think they are, I think they’re looking forward to playing against somebody else right now. But you know, we still, we’re going to look at this. We’ve still got a lot of growth to be had throughout the season, and I think, you know, for us, a week’s time, we should be a better basketball team in one week than we are now. And I think that’s the progression that we have to continue. To continue to look at with our team.”
Question: “What about this specific group of players gets you excited about coaching them this season?
Harper: “They’re really good kids. I mean, they are really, they’re great people, I love being around them. I love walking into practice every day with them, and they want it. They want to do what you ask them to do. They’re, it’s a group of pleasers. They want to do it right. And I think the, we just have to continuously find ways to challenge them each and every day.”
Question: When you look back on it now, what was the process of being able to put this roster together like?
Harper: “Obviously, I’ve taken over several programs, this being the fifth one, so I’ve done this a lot. But this is the first time I’ve done it with the transfer portal being a big option and a necessity. So, for us, we had to get our returners established, and then we had to go out and address some needs, specifically a little bit of size and specifically some athleticism on
the perimeter.”
Question: When you’re needing to fill as many roster spots as you had, what were some of the intangible qualities that you were looking at to tell you someone was going to be a good fit for your group?
Harper: “Yeah, I think there are so many different things. It’s not there’s not just one box that kids check and you move on. I think for the, we want to do it the right way. We want to do this with really good people. I think we did that, I think we checked that box. I think we have a really good group in that locker room. Not to say things won’t get challenging throughout the year, it always does.
“But I think when you start with quality character people, then you can get through things. So that was, that was important. I think position was important. Did we need this specific thing? Was it a center? Was it a shooting guard? Or was it a point guard? What did we need? So we had to address those things. We wanted to get players that also had, had some success, whether that was winning or being productive themselves, individually.
“So, you know, and then, and then you’ve got to go out and recruit, and you get, you got to beat somebody for these players. So it’s not, you’re not just hand picking them. You’re hand picking and then you have to beat somebody in recruiting process. So, it’s, it’s not the easiest thing, and it happens so quickly. Recruit, the recruiting portal is like speed dating, actually.”
Question: When you mention the portal and what you’re able to do to a roster in the space of just a few months, is there expectations that you can hit the ground immediately running or do you still need to preach a little bit of patience here in Year 1?
Harper: “Oh, I think, I think patience. You know, for us, I think our plan is to continue to build. And I think the best teams will be the teams where we can grow and develop together for years. I think that’s going to be the best teams now. We want to be as competitive as we can possibly be right now. So, the, don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to short change us, you know, and not push for the best right now. But also I think in the in, you know, the grand scheme of things, in a huge lens, we want to see growth, and I think you do that with consistency over time.”
Question: Specifically with Grace Slaughter and being able to see her leadership stay here with the Missouri program. How important is that to you to see that those leaders do want to stay here and play for you, play for this program?
Harper: “Yeah, I think it’s really important. I think we have a really good core. Obviously, Grace (Slaughter) being back is really important for our basketball team. She’s an established player, very talented, you know, one of the better players in our league. And I think that was important that she stayed. I think it I think that’s what we need, you know. And I think she showed, as well as the other returners, you know, I think the five players that stayed made a big statement. They want to do it. They want to do it here, and they believe that we can do this here. They’re gonna, listen, that’s gonna be, you know, five years from now, I want to talk about those five kids. I want to talk about those kids that made a commitment to stay here and look what we have done now.”
Question: As far as being competitive, you mentioned you want to be competitive the first year, but what does success look like for you in your first season?
Harper: “Yeah, you know, defining success is so difficult. And I’ll be honest with you, I don’t know that I can, I’ll be able to define it right now. I think that’s going to be something we look back on. And, you know, we’ll have team goals, but it may be, it may be game to game. What are our goals this game? And what’s a success long term? You know, we, I think it’s, I think it’s hard. I think you can’t control so many things. If I say we want to win X number of games, I can’t control injuries. I can’t control the opponents.
“You know, I can’t control so many things, travel woes. There’s just so many different things that could pop up. I think that’s a little unfair at times, at this point, but I do think we will have goals, and we will try to meet those goals as a program, certainly moving forward.”
Question: Talking to Grace (Slaughter) in the offseason, she mentioned playing fast paced. That was kind of the word that you used to describe this team. How do you feel like this team is going to work different on the court?
Harper: “You know, I’m hopeful that our team will be able to get up and down at a good pace. I want to think quicker, I want to not just run quicker, but think quicker. I think that’ll be important. We will be very broad based defensively. We’re going to give them, hopefully, show a lot of different looks, you know? I want to make sure that we’re competitive. You know?
“I don’t want, I don’t want to be OK with losing. I think that’s going to be important. That’s not my mindset, that’s not my competitive nature, and I want our team to showcase that either, but also understand there’s a journey here. There’s a journey. And I wanted to, I want them to enjoy the journey, and I want them to enjoy the process, and just, you don’t skip ahead. It’s every single day. And I think they, I think they’ve embraced that.”
Question: You mentioned that idea of thinking quicker. What does that look like to you? And how do you implement and teach that?
Harper: “Yeah, it’s a very hard thing to teach, actually. So thinking quicker is being one step ahead on the defensive end. What if I’m guarding you? What are you about to do? Not what you’re doing, because then you’re too late, you know? What are you about to do?
“I think also offensively, reads and reactions quicker. A lot of that’s reps. Some players are naturally quicker thinkers and it’s easier, and some players are more process driven. And more process-driven players have to practice those speeds at a very uncomfortable level and practice for that to translate over to games.”
Question: In your final season at Tennessee, you had Rickea Jackson, one of the best plug and play player from the transfer portal. Do you have any players like that on the team for this year?
Harper: “Listen, this year, we’re going to rely on everybody. If you’re on our roster, you’re going to contribute. So, some way, somehow, everybody has to contribute. But I do think we do have players from the transfer portal that are going to have to come in and give us quite a bit of production. Whether that’s points, defense, rebounds, handling the basketball.
“I mean, we’re going to rely on everybody, and I think everybody’s here for a reason, I don’t think there are any surprises. I think everybody that we recruited to be here is exactly what we thought they would be, and when they step on the court, we’ll expect, expect them to perform.”
Question: From a positional fit, it seems like Jordana (Reisma) is going to be a really important player. And maybe bear a lot of minutes as well this season. How important is she going to be to the team this year and what is her role going to look like?
Harper: “Well, there’s no doubt that, you know, anybody can look at our roster and, you know, put two and two together and realize that there’s not a lot of depth in that center position. And so Jordana is going to be really critical, because she’s going to get a big chunk of minutes playing that position.
“I think she’s, she’s very athletic, she’s mobile, she knows what she’s doing. She can score with both hands. She’s got good footwork. Offensively, she’s got good hands. Runs the floor really well. So, we’re really excited about how she fits our system, but you know, obviously it fits the need for the team as well.”
Question: You already talked about wanting to play fast on offense. But what are some other character traits, maybe more so in the half court that you think are going to define this season?
Harper: “Yeah, I think that’s where, when we talk about playing fast, I think a lot of people have this misconception of getting the ball from one end to the other fast, and we would like to do that. But when we talk about playing fast, we want to actually do it in the half court. We want to be able to run our offensive sets quickly. We’re still working on that. It’s still a process. It’s still a process for us, but I think our players understand where we’re trying to go with it.
“But it, if we’re offensively, sharing the basketball is going to be important. I think utilizing our ability to read screens, both on and off the ball inside out, working behind the 3-point line, that’s going to be really important for us to continue to find 3s and make them and then putting the ball on the floor and get ourselves to the free throw line. So, you know, we want to make sure that our offense is all encompassing.
“I think our players fit the offense. This is, this is by design. We took our team, we knew who we were going to be able to get, and put the offense, set up the offense to help them succeed.”
Question: You alluded to earlier, you’ve been in a few places where you’ve built programs. Obviously, this is a different era than when you were at other schools. But what have you learned about what it takes to get a group of people, especially those who hadn’t played with each other before previously, how to get them to gel quickly?
Harper: “Well, it’s good, it’s a great question. And one of our No. 1 priorities this entire summer was it was not our ball-screen defense. Our No. 1 priority was our team chemistry. And now in December, I’m going to wish it was our ball-screen defense. I’m sure, very sure of it. But it, I know how important that is. I know now we bring in great kids that’s going to help. But also, they have to learn to communicate. They have to learn to work together.
“They have to learn to pull together. Because what we’re about to do is going to be really hard, and we talk about that all the time, it’s going to be really hard. This is not going to be easy, and we’re going to have huge challenges throughout the season. And when you have those challenges, when you have adversity, you’re going to fall back to habits. And do we have good habits? Do we have great team-ism, and do we have great team chemistry? And do we have great teammates to fall on and to lean on in those moments? Because you do, you have to have a strong locker room to do what we’re trying to do.”
Question: What were a couple of the things that went into trying to build that team chemistry?
Harper: “We took our team to, well, first off, everything we do is intentional. Every single detail of what we, every decision that we make is intentional. So, I mean, you would, minute details are not minute. I mean, they’re so important. We took our team to a retreat. We had a Lake retreat. My daughter still thinks it was for her birthday, so don’t tell her anything different.
“But we took our team, spent some time together, just being together. We also did several exercises together to start working on that team chemistry, we also talked about it a lot. We did some other, you know, fun little exercises with each other in the summer, small things, but could have a big impact.
“And I think we really accomplished our goals this summer, we have a, have meetings with our players, and every, every player on their exit, exit meeting with me in the summer raved about their teammates and the chemistry and connection that we have.”
Question: As of right now, you have 13 players listed on the roster. A little smaller from the usual 15 you see at the DI level. What’s it like managing a smaller roster? Especially from an injury standpoint?
Harper: “Yeah, well, 13 is not small until you get injuries. That, I’ll be honest with you, 13 is about what I’ve carried the majority of my career. I can’t keep 15 happy very often. I’ll say that. But I do need a few in case of injuries and we’ve been, we’ve had a few players in and out of practice with a few things thus far. And that’s where you know, as a coach, you take advantage of your practice players. We have a male practice team that are students on campus. They’ve been awesome. They’ve been phenomenal. They’re giving us great looks right now. So, we utilize them a lot, and especially when we have low numbers.”
Question: You weren’t doing this last year, you weren’t in front of cameras. Was there a moment that you realized that you’ve missed it this summer?
Harper: “I’ll be honest with you, I had, I was having lunch with or dinner with Todd Schaefer, one of my assistants. He was over at dinner. I cook occasionally. He was over at our house for dinner, and we were just talking with my kids and my husband, and I made the comment at that point, I’m just happy. I’m just really happy.
“So, I’ve enjoyed every bit of this. I’ve enjoyed the process, I’ve enjoyed the complexity of the recruiting, trying to put a team together. I’ve enjoyed working with the staff to figure out, it is a talented staff and we’re, there’s six of us trying to figure out who’s going to do what, and how we allow each voice to be heard. You know, I love figuring out the ins and outs within the athletic department, how you go about this process. How is this process done?
“I love working to make our program more efficient. I just really enjoyed myself. I’ve enjoyed putting this group together, and I enjoy planning practice. I, I’m really a very, very happy person right now. I’m still undefeated. I don’t know, I don’t know how long, I don’t know how long, but I’m going to tell you what, I’m going to enjoy, I’m going to enjoy this year. Period.
“I’m going to make that happen. That’s the one thing that I saw last year, I observed from friends and peers, a lot of people were, they were looking at things the wrong way. You know, it was all about the wins and losses. It was all about this and all about that. And I’m going to make sure that I enjoy this year lives. Life is too short. I love what I do, and nobody’s going to ruin that.”
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