Last Sunday UNCG beat Chattanooga 64-57 in OT in the SoCon women’s tourney title game to earn an automatic bid to next week’s NCAA tournament. The Spartans have won 14 games in a row as they claimed the school’s 1st NCAA tourney bid since 1998. Earlier today HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel got to speak with UNCG women’s coach Trina Patterson about being a builder and making the NCAA tourney.
As a basketball player at Virginia you led the team in rebounding as a junior and were team captain as a senior: what is the key to being a great rebounder, and what is the key to being a great leader? Rebounding is about heart/desire: you can have all the technique you want in terms of your hands/positioning…but it is about going after it. If you have a tough team, then they will be good at rebounding. I played vs. guys when I was growing up, so I had to be tough enough to get on the court. I was the oldest child/oldest grandchild, which forced me to lead, and I was captain of my high school team in Newport News, VA. My mother was a teacher, so I had to do things the right way. I studied the traits of good leaders: I am going to be Trina, but my husband is a retired Marine, and I learned from him as well. So many people are poured into me.
Your coach was Women’s Basketball Hall of Famer Debbie Ryan: what made her such a great coach, and what was the most important thing that you ever learned from her? She recruited me and taught me how to work hard because she saw those leadership qualities in me. We had some incredibly difficult things to do, and she focused on working hard/playing defense. My position coach for 2 years was a guy you might have heard of named…Geno Auriemma!
You won 26 games in 1987 and made it to the Sweet 16: what was it like to face Tennessee coach Pat Summit in postseason play? I later coached against Pat as an assistant. We did not have a chance that day on the road at Tennessee: their fans were intimidating, their defense pressured us a lot, and she was a phenomenal coach.
In 2014 you made the Final 4 as an assistant to Tara VanDerveer at Stanford before losing to eventual champion UConn: what was it like to face that undefeated Huskies team featuring Breanna Stewart/Geno? Working with Tara every day helped me a lot. I got that job due to my involvement in USA Basketball: I spent 1-on-1 time with her every year on the Selection Committee. It was an honor to work for her, but I moved back to Virginia after 2 years because my father’s health was declining. I worked with a pair of future #1 draft picks in Chiney/Nneka Ogwumike and I appreciated all those moments. I was like a sponge and just tried to help Tara win a title, and I try to teach our assistants now the same thing.
Your UNCG team had back-to-back seasons of single-digit wins in 2021/2022: at the time did you think that a 25-win season would be possible? Winning a championship was always in my mind. Situations ebb and flow: the year after COVID was hard for everyone. We won 23 games the year before that but then took a dip. I knew that I would be able to build this program.
You have been named conference COY in the CAA/America East/SoCon: what did it mean to you to receive such outstanding honors? I am a builder! All the jobs I got were not great jobs. William & Mary had never had a winning season…but we won 20 games in year #3. Albany had quickly transitioned from D-3 to D-2 to D-1…and we went .500 in year #3. When I took this job they had not had a winning season in 5 years…and we built it. Some of us might be lucky enough to get handed a great established program, but most of us have to build it while making changes.
Your team’s 51.8 PPG allowed is #3 in the nation: what is the secret to playing great defense? Spartan basketball is like John Wooden’s “Pyramid of Success”, and defense is the foundation. We can travel with it and our players understand how important it is. We have an elite person in Khalis Cain, who protects the rim as our “street sweeper”, and we do not waste time on things that are unimportant: we only do drills that are key to the game. It goes back to Debbie: if you cannot play defense then you will not win a championship.
Last Sunday in the SoCon women’s tourney title game your team had a 7-PT OT win over Chattanooga to clinch the title: what did it mean to you to win a title, and what was the reaction like when you got back to campus? It means everything. I am thankful to God for the opportunity to do what I love doing. I enjoy coaching young women and helping them become champions both on/off the court. To finally reach my goal from year #1 was surreal: tears were flying, and I could not believe it happened. When I got back to campus I slept for 2 days because I was so tired, but I have pressed the reset button and now I am back. Every 1 of our players/coaches/administrators helped us get this result.
Your fellow Cavalier alum Dawn Staley has won 2 of the past 3 NCAA women’s titles as coach at South Carolina: how proud are you of all her success, and do you think that she can make it 3 of the past 4? I do. My best friend in college was Dawn Bryant, who is from Philly, and she knew Dawn Staley. Debbie told us that Staley was good, which I did not want to hear at the time, but when she showed up she was lights-out. I have the utmost respect for her: she built Temple, then built South Carolina, and has done so much for our sport. We are in a great space for women’s basketball: it is a great place to be.
You enter the NCAA tourney on a 14-game winning streak: what kind of seed do you think you deserve, and what kind of seed do you think you will get? What we deserve will be based on our body of work. We lost to UTSA and really played well against Georgia/Wake Forest. We competed against UNC, but did not get the win. I think we would have gotten a 13/14 seed if we had beaten 1 of those Power 4 teams, but we might get a 15 seed due to a bid thief if we are ranked higher than them in the NET.
