After Sunday's upset of then-No. 2 North Carolina, there was no doubt that while the Penn State Lady Lions were justifiably jubilant, it was going to take more than one big win to completely turn around the season.
"This win tells us that we need to keep working," Tanisha Wright said Sunday.
"We will celebrate tonight and then hit the gym tomorrow. We can't have a letdown game, we just need to keep going."
Hopefully the Lady Lions managed to get all the celebrating out of the way pretty quickly.
"We practiced at 5:30 this morning," acting head coach Annie Troyan said yesterday afternoon.
"We went after them pretty hard to let them know, 'You had time to enjoy that game, now we need to go get our first road win.' "
Penn State's record currently stands at 3-3, but all three of its victories have come in the friendly confines of the Bryce Jordan Center and tomorrow night's game against Pittsburgh is a good test for Penn State in that it is a potential trap game.
Last year, Penn State knocked off No. 2 Texas, and senior guard Jess Strom said yesterday that she thought the Lady Lions' loss to Louisiana Tech three games later was because of a letdown.
Troyan has emphasized emotion ever since she took over in head coach.
Rene Portand's absence, and the team has responded with three straight wins.
Yesterday, she made sure that the Lady Lions kept their focus after Sunday's victory.
"Every drill that we went into, if they did not rebound on the first possession, there was a consequence," Troyan said.
"If we turned the ball over on the offensive set, there was a consequence. Right away we went in with the mindset that we need to be focused on each drill. I think we got through to them pretty quick."
Portland update
News on head coach Rene Portland's medical condition remains vague.
Troyan was careful not to divulge any information regarding Portland, but has said that even in her absence she still has input in the program and that the players were able to talk to her after Sunday's victory.
"She is just getting more opinions and no news is good news at this point. She is still doing what she needs to do to get back to the team," Troyan said.
No Pretzels For You
Troyan said that she is becoming more comfortable behind the bench every game.
Yet she admitted that she was still somewhat baffled by the public nature of her position.
When asked if she gets recognized in public more than she did during her days as an assistant coach she said, "Yes, a whole lot more. I was just in Wal-Mart and I got approached like five times buying pretzels. I thought, 'This is unbelievable.' "
All About The Bandages
Despite yesterday's intense practice, Troyan still found time to take a few jabs at the team's walking wounded -- Jess Strom and Ashli Schwab.
Both have received stitches above the eye in the last week, and Troyan saw fit to make a few strategic edits to the media guide.
"The cover of our media guide says 'Charged Up' and Annie thought it would be funny to put 'Stitched Up' and put these things on our faces." Strom said, pointing to the bandages over her eye.
