Iowa State University Athletics
Fennelly, Nisleit Take Part in Big 12 Media Day
10.22.2008 | Women's Basketball
OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla. ? The Big 12 Conference held its annual women's basketball media day Wednesday at the Cox Convention Center, the site of the 2009 Phillips 66 Big 12 Women's Basketball Championship. Iowa State head coach Bill Fennelly and senior Amanda Nisleit made the trip to Oklahoma City along with Senior Associate Athletics Director Calli Sanders and radio play-by-play analyst Rich Fellingham to take part in the event.
 Big 12 Media Day Photos and Quotes | ||
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The trip began at 5:45 a.m. when the group gathered at the Ames airport and wrapped up at 1:30 p.m. when the University plane landed back in Ames. The rain followed the Cyclones all the way to Oklahoma and the bad weather across the Midwest caused Kansas' coach and student-athletes to arrive much later than scheduled, setting the media day agenda into disarray from the very beginning.
Read below to see how the day unfolded for Fennelly and Nisleit.
5:45 a.m. - The travel party met at the Iowa State University hangar, dressed and ready to go. The weather was wet and chilly, but fortunately didn't cause any problems as the plane left promptly at 6 a.m.
7:00 a.m. - The line of bad weather all the way to Oklahoma caused the pilots to take a detour through Kansas and made for a more turbulent flight than usual. Nisleit worked on homework for a while and took a short nap in preparation for the day ahead.
8:30 a.m. - After landing, the group was immediately informed that Kansas was having problems and the Big 12 needed to move press conference times. As always, Fennelly was more than accommodating and told the conference he would make whatever changes necessary. It looked for a minute like the Iowa State crew might be tardy as well, as they hit rush hour traffic in Oklahoma City. It quickly dissipated, however, and the group arrived right on time, walking into the building at 9 a.m. sharp.
9:15 a.m. - After the usual welcomes and handshakes, Nisleit and Fennelly made their way to the FSN room, where they handled interviews with the network which carries a large number of Big 12 women's basketball games throughout the season. Fennelly was asked “What is the most important thing in your life?” He quickly answered, “Without question, it's my family. My wife Deb is my best recruit of all time.”
9:22 a.m. - Just a few minutes behind schedule, the adjusted schedule anyway, Fennelly went to the podium for his 10-minute press conference. After taking his seat, Fennelly looked through the stack of head coaches name cards, and said he was looking for the coaches who made all the money, drawing a laugh from the crowd of reporters from across the league.
9:35 a.m. - Nisleit went for an interview with the Big 12 which will be posted to its website. She answered “fun” non-basketball related questions. She was asked what reality show she would like to be on and she responded with "Survivor." “We get together and watch it as a team. I would be good at the challenges, but not good at all the alliances and backstabbing,” she commented.
10:00 a.m. - Kansas still hadn't made it to OKC, so another schedule change occurred. The coaches and student-athletes were assigned a table for each school and they were open for one-on-one interviews. Coach Fennelly, a media favorite in the league, answered a constant stream of questions for 45 minutes straight. Nisleit talked to a handful of reporters before being dismissed for another Big 12 website interview.
10:45 a.m. - The Big 12 began a “round-table” session with the women's players. The goal is to get the student-athletes to talk about things most reporters don't know about them or their teams in order to promote the human-interest side of women's basketball. Six players from the morning session (six teams going in the morning and six in the afternoon) sat at the front of the room as FSN announcer Brenda VanLengen asked questions. Baylor's Jhasmin Player talked about the support she received from players and coaches from every team in the conference after tearing her ACL last season.
While Nisleit participated in the round table, Fennelly finished up the interviews he had left with the Big 12 website, so we could head back to Ames a bit early.
11:45 a.m. - The group was back at the airport and in the air by noon. It didn't take long before Nisleit was back at work on homework and Fennelly was jotting down notes working on preparations for exciting season ahead.
1:25 p.m. - The flight home was a much smoother ride. At least the rain was gone upon the groups return. In the words of Sanders, “We've accomplished a lot in a half a day!”
