Doc Rivers Postgame Press Conference | 2.23.24

Doc Rivers Postgame Press Conference | 2.23.24

We need to get USC to play Iowa in the women’s that would be sweet man all right basketball um just for you late um Dame starts off one for nine to start the game just what do you see from his confidence to hit some big shots in yeah

I thought it was right uh towards the end of the second he got a basket um I thought the key was in the third quarter we came out spread the floor move the ball the ball was moving and I think I told you guys two weeks ago like you can there’s

Guys that you can see if the ball’s moving or not uh Malik had zero attempts at halftime and ended up with 12 I told him he probably should have just had 10 cuz two of those were terrible shots uh but that’s that’s what got everybody going and then once you get that Dame

And Yannis are now in the open floor uh so they were both fantastic um it it did seem like a real emphasis for Giannis to start kicking to the corner for to start seeing those just what were you guys trying to emphasize at halftime about

Finding Malik yeah we we I I held up that stat sheet and said o0 for o like that’s what you see you know uh and I also just talked about we got to open the floor back up we start getting congested again and the ball had to

Change S so first four five plays were all about ball changing sides of the floor getting to the second action and then letting the ball lead to wherever it led to and Dame and Yannis are the ones that that made all the passes it was terrific um giving up

107 uh you you know and then to be able sort of lean on some stops defensively obviously your two stars late just what did that mean to to beat this team here yeah to beat this team here is is great especially after they just beat us um

You know we’ve done pretty well with the Revenge games you know did it against Denver did it here um and then defensively the third quarter well 17 points or 12 points whatever it was I mean that’s unbelievable and then down the stretch to get four stops in a row

You know that’s that’s what we have to become over the third quarter was as good as you’re going to play defense but the end of the game getting stops you have to be able to lean on your defense down the stretch of games and our guys

Are starting to to believe that you know that was great um what did it say to you that Dam and Giannis are doing their thing fourth quarter but Giannis dumps it to Jay it’s his only bucket of the game it was a huge play in that huge

Play yeah just trust and and that’s all we’re talking about is Trust the pass you know Giannis and Dame are going to have the ball in their hands let’s say 80% of the game uh the more they trust and get everybody else involved the better they’re going to be um you can

See they stopped double teaming Giannis uh they stopped double teaming uh Dame because we were making shots and we’re spreading the floor and the more they keep trusting like that the better we’re going to be on offense uh just games like tonight wi wins like tonight you especially with

The defensive stops that you mentioned they just kind of like reinforce that these things that you’ve been preaching that you guys to saying that like you know we’re going in the right direction I’m saying it um we’re still not there uh but we’re definitely on our way uh

When or not I’m saying that because you can see it I said that the other night so um you know still just you know we have those stretches offensively you know two minute stretches where we don’t get the right look or or we’re not organized um defensively we lost a

Couple guys but it’s trust it’s building and I love what’s going on the bench you know they’re telling each other now you know jannis sat down in the chair in the fourth quarter and was telling our guys we got to lock in on the defensive end gave a great speech before the game

About defense you know uh I think they trust their offense once we get everybody we know we’re going to score uh but if we start getting stops we can score a lot of points uh we talked about the 13-point third quarter what stands out to you about the defense like what

What were you doing well in that I thought the flections um I thought um the rotations and we took away their threes like our job coming out uh we got every rebound cuz they crushed Us in the first half off the glass uh we ran them off the

Three and made them take tough twos and if they made those they just make those that’s what we were saying at halftime and they did that um I I don’t think Giannis gets a bucket in the fourth quarter but he he created buckets you know uh everyone scores you know that’s

What we try to preach like jannis scored because he gave j a basket Giannis created scoring that’s how we look at scoring like if someone scores that means the team scored everybody scored and I thought Giannis offensively was fantastic in the fourth quarter with with the you know free throw line but

Also with his passing I was going to say a couple of those come on offensive rebounds just what do you think of his relentlessness in that fourth quarter to to do it on both sides kind of to do it on both sides um you know one thing you

Can see with our team I don’t know if there’s any place to do it uh but you can see conditioning cuz they’re playing hard they were they were gas they were a bunch of guys gas on our team for sure uh that’s what happens when you play

Hard defense and hard offense uh so we’re going to have to try to condition in games you know to get that cuz we have to get used to playing that way uh for 48 minutes I mean along those lines bees has no shots but three fouls in the

First half on Ant two steals third quarter even though he got some shots there was still a steel defle got the steel we said that at halftime or after the game that Jay Crowder makes a big bucket didn’t get a lot of shots missed a few open ones early had just played

Unbelievable defense bees you come out the beginning of the third quarter get two deflections get a steal you didn’t let the zero for zero affect you on the other end uh and that’s what we talked about early on when I first got it you

Can see that our off if I didn’t get my offense I didn’t play defense now they’re locked in on defense uh just late the communication offense L it felt like whoever you guys wanted in the action like was getting there and that requires you finding that guy what do

You think of the guys finding we were finding the right guys um we went too late I will say that I mean we we were starting at 8 and 7 you know with with a minute left that’s a little late uh we’ll talk about that um but for me just

Learning what they want too what Dame and and uh Giannis wants I want to find out where they want it when they want it and and uh I thought overall we picked the right guys

Head coach Doc Rivers spoke to the media following Friday night’s win over the Timberwolves in Minnesota.

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