Tulane head coach David Schumacher

On the match . . .
“I didn’t think that doubles went as well as we would have liked, but doubles hasn’t been our strength all year, so we didn’t panic. As I told our players, (Texas) A&M is a very good team, but they (our players) are better than they know they are, and we just needed to win four of the singles matches.”

On Nancy Kockott’s match-clinching win . . .
“We had three previous matches this season come down to a single match, tied 3-3, and each time Nancy was involved, and each time Nancy lost, so she had the experience in that type of situation. I was very proud of her today because she kept her composure and attacking style and really dominated in the third-set tiebreaker.”

On the significance of today’s victory . . .
“The thing I was telling them was to believe in themselves. Even though we had never won an NCAA tournament match before, we had also never won a Conference USA Championship before, which we did a few weeks ago. They all had to play very well to do it. We had some close losses early in the season and when you fight that many battles, you are battle scarred. But you are also battle tested and I think that helped.”

Tulane freshman Nancy Kockott

On being the deciding match . . .
“It was great. This is not my first time as the deciding match, but it is the first time I won. I think it was about time I won a deciding match.”

On the victory . . .
“In the second-set tiebreaker, I got a little too mad. I just played a lot better in the third set than I did in the first two sets. I tried to be a little more consistent than I had been.”

Texas A&M head coach Bobby Kleinecke

On the match . . .
“It was an extremely tough loss. It was a terrible way to end a good season. We just made too many errors. Tulane doesn’t hurt you too much, but they make you hurt yourself and that’s what we did today. They put a lot of balls in play and we just didn’t compete as well as we needed to. Give them credit for coming back after losing the doubles point.”

On the deciding No. 4 singles match . . .
“She (Tulane’s Nancy Kockott) is a good, talented player. I think the two players (Kockott and Texas A&M’s Leah Killen) are very similar except Kockott was a little better at the net today. We were up 5-3 in the third set and that’s an opportunity you’ve got to take advantage of, but we didn’t.”