Debra Pegram Quotations

We spent so much time on the defensive end of the court in practice. All 10 of my players were quick or really strong post defenders. I didn't have anyone that I felt would get scored upon by most people in high school. That gave me the freedom to sub more.

We're going to have to play some outstanding defense. We have to box out to get rebounds, improve our foul shooting and take care of the basketball.

We were in contact with someone watching the game at Reynolds and we knew pretty much when the last shot was made and they won.

She's probably the most complete player on the team. She can run our offense from the perimeter, or I can post her up in the paint. We're very fortunate to have her.

She's a little under the weather. She had a sore throat and people were trying to find her some cough drops and they finally found some. I didn't realize they had to go to Wal-Mart to get them, but they brought her a whole bag of 'em!

Monique is a clutch player. She is very confident and capable, and she will be a tremendous basketball player by the time she leaves high school.

I was surprised. I honestly thought we would play either Western Harnett or Dudley. In my past experiences, we have always been paired with somebody farther west.

I didn't anticipate them playing us man, I really didn't. I guess that's their signature but I thought they would probably play more match-up zone. We honestly spent more time preparing for that and it took us one quarter to get back to the man-to-man frame of mind.

I don't know who those people were in the first half wearing our uniforms. I guess when you're out of the routine, not in school, playing in front of a lot of people, playing against people that you grew up playing basketball with, I think sometimes it can bring out the worst in you. That's pretty much what happened.

I though we played great in the second half to correct some things, I knew they were going to play us tough.

I thought we did a good job in our offensive sets against their zone. Jean got a lot of easy baskets, and we did a good job of setting picks and getting her the basketball against the zone.

I thought we had a very good shot at getting back. We are very glad to be there and, once you get to Greenville, anything can happen.

I thought they handled it beautifully, I really did. Of course, they came on out fire and had that little lull but, overall, I think they did a great job.

I think that it's great we get the chance to see each other again. I think it's kind of sad that one of us won't be able to make it to the regional championships, because we're such great friends. But, on the flip side, at least this guarantees that one of us will.

I think they just underestimated Hunt's intensity tonight. I think they were just assuming (Hunt) would just be afraid because of our record.

Our post people are really going to have to work on their post defense because we have (Valentine and Little) we'll have to contend with. And we've just got to stay out of foul trouble and not try to block every shot and just play good, solid defense.

That doesn't mean a thing. I want to go undefeated in the state playoffs. We've got to improve if we want that to happen.

I was really happy about our effort tonight. I thought we did a great job of passing the ball. Everybody got a chance to touch it.

We had four pretty decent players at our service every day.

We have to keep our big girls (Harris and Best) from getting into foul trouble. That was one of the main factors that cost us in our loss against Dudley in the regional semifinals last year.

We were getting in so much foul trouble trying to execute our traps. I am so excited about our half-court game. We executed beautifully with our back picks and lob passes.

We didn't press as much as we normally do. We wanted to look at some other things we can do out of a half-court offensive set.

We don't like to depend on only one or two people in our offense. It's working better when everyone contributes and is a threat.

We've never mentioned our record at all. I know that a lot of people probably talk about it, but we just worry about trying to get better for our next opponent.

We have a couple of guys who played junior varsity basketball who have come out to practices and we go against them every day and it helps.

We kind of had a slow start but I thought we played a great second half and corrected some things. I knew they were going to play us tough, they always do. They're very physical.

We tried to mix up our defense and got out and tried to play a little more zone. We're just not a zone-principled team.

Eastern Wayne has a lot of young girls on their team. So when we put pressure on their guards, we were able to force turnovers that led to easy baskets.

Our seniors worked real hard this year to establish team chemistry. We will miss them very much. They gave us a lot of memories that we will always cherish.

They were kind of shocked like I was. A couple of them just reacted that we have to make sure we take care of business and don't rely on what has happened already this season.

This has been a dream season and a dream team. These three young ladies are very close and I love them and they love me.

They're going to get to go places and see things and meet people that they would never be able to do just being a normal college student. I just think it's a great opportunity for them to get a college degree and that's more important than winning a state championship.

It starts with that. I'm hoping we'll finish that with one more win.

It started this summer. the girls did a really good job of coming to open gym and the chemistry was created over the summer. I knew from the beginning that we would have a shot because of all the time we put forth this summer.

It's been a great year. All of the girls have been a joy to coach.

It's been a lot of blood, sweat and tears to this point. It's a great, great way to end the season and I've said it before, this is the way these three should go out. They deserve every recognition and everything that's come to them because they've worked hard, been great leaders and we've beaten some very good teams to get to this point.

It's been a family and we spend so much time together. Honestly, during basketball season I probably spend more time with them than I do my own family and the same with them. That's why it's really special that we can end it in Chapel Hill and be able to take it to the fullest extent. I would hate to be shorted a week with them.

That's definitely the highest number of kids I've had on the first team. I think that they're all worthy of being put there.

(The Lady Panthers are) probably the most athletic team we've seen except our J.V. boys. We're definitely going to have to box out and take care of the basketball because they like to trap. Not a lot of people have trapped us this year so we're definitely going to have to be prepared for that.

I'm real honored to share (Coach-of-the Year honors) with Coach Thomas. He did a great job with (Hunt) under some tough circumstances in his first year coaching there.

I hope they can take this success and enjoy it for awhile but then come back with that same hunger that this team had this year.

I'm very disappointed with our defensive effort tonight and we will definitely be working on that (Wednesday) in practice I assure you.

I know they always say the competition in the west is stronger than back east but we kind of created our own competition with former college players against my high school kids.

I'm very happy for our seniors. This has been a very special group. All 10 of these young ladies, I love 'em dearly. They've been a pleasure to coach and this definitely will be a team I will always remember.

I honestly didn't know anything about it, until one of my players looked it up on the Internet and told me. I have been blessed with good players, so all of the recognition should go to them.

In the second half, we really tried to slow it down and run our half-court offense. We're going to have to deal with that because we're not going to outrun everybody in the state. We're going to have be prepared to settle down.