Coach Brown and De’Aaron Fox postgame media availability vs. Knicks | 3.16.24

Coach Brown and De’Aaron Fox postgame media availability vs. Knicks | 3.16.24

Uh Daren real physical game I’m sure you know the outcome wasn’t what you wanted but but can you guys take something away from uh just kind of the fight that it took to to play with these guys yeah I mean uh we knew that that’s that’s the

Style of play that they wanted and uh I mean as best as we could we tried to get out and get out and run to try to uh just negate some of that physicality but yeah I mean that’s that’s the way that they play and uh we played right into their hands obviously

Not not a great conversion rate for you guys tonight but how do you feel like you guys did it creating looks I think we did a good job I think uh we able to get to the free throw line um obviously we we held them to 43 29%

From from three but uh we just weren’t able to convert on those on the breaks that we had and I feel like we got good looks and I felt like uh I mean we just I feel like a a lot of it we just didn’t make shots uh

But that’s a good defensive team but you have to be able to capitalize on any of their mistakes and I don’t think we did a good job with that tonight were you kind of expecting a a low-scoring grinded out type of game with them definitely I mean that’s you know last

Five games I think they’re giv up average of like 90 points that’s the way that they’re playing but um I think for us if we if if we make some of those open shots it might look a little differently but we did Darren that felt like playoff

Basketball is it good for you guys to have these games like all the way down down the stretch here as you’re trying to fight your way in yeah definitely I mean like I said like we said before they say the games aren’t officiated any differently we know that’s a lot um but

I mean that’s I feel like these last couple games have felt that way and I think that’s good for it Cu uh you don’t have to get to you don’t have to get to the playoffs and then be like oh we have to adjust to the way that they’re

Officiating if they’re going to officiate it like this uh throughout the playoffs I think uh I think it’s good for all teams I think it’s good for the league I know it’s difficult to take positives right after a fresh off of a loss but the ability of you guys to

Battle back from I think two nine-point deficits and keep fighting even though the shots weren’t falling how do you feel that you responded in moments where it looked like the Knicks could potentially create some separation uh I mean I think I think outside of JB uh I

Think we did a great job obviously you know he shoots 17 for 28 I don’t know what that is like 60 something percent we still hold that team to 43% So like um outside of him we did a great job but I mean he he had almost half of their

Points so we have to do a better job guarding the star player but um other than that man I think we I think we did a decent job and he he also made some difficult shots as well but I think as a whole defensively I would say we did a

We did a pretty good job um offensively I mean we shot 35 27 we have to be better on the offensive end um not many games you’re going to win shooting that low of percentages um before I get started uh um I meant to bring this up uh before the game but uh

You guys got to check out uh Kyle Draper’s article somebody sent me an article on on him uh that the athletic wrote and uh man I I admire him even more after reading that article you know seven years of sobriety and him fighting like he’s fighting every day uh to stay

On the right path and you know when you read stories like that I don’t care who you are uh it Inspire it should inspire you uh I know uh I know he’s inspired me after reading that story and man what what a what a hell of a journey hell of

A story that uh that he put out there and I know it’s helped plenty of other people so if you hadn’t had a chance to take a look at it try to try to look it up and take a look at it that’s a it’s an eye openening

Deal and especially with him putting it all out there the way he did um tell you uh game was a physical game um you know I their physicality I thought impacted us shooting the ball even when we were open because I thought we had some open looks that we normally

Get and and uh because of how physical they are they hit they grab they push you and stuff like that throughout the course of the game um I thought it impacted the way we shot the ball because I I know Keegan had a couple of wide open ones Kevin had some wide open

Ones HP you know go down the line and and uh we shot 27 28% from the three-point line um part of it part of it for us offensively too was you know get back to the sprays you know um this is this team is similar to Houston where uh when you touch the

Paint they’re coming they’re coming and they’re not just coming to put their bodies there they’re coming and swiping down and and hitting you and grabbing you and all that other stuff and hardenstein big boy down there and OG’s big too and and uh we got to spray the

Ball you you know we again we’re three for nine in sprays tonight and when you’re three for nine against a team like that that’s not good it’s going to it’s going to it’s going to impact you uh in ways that you can’t imagine because you’re playing right into their

Hands they they want you to try to score over them hitting grabbing swiping down at the ball so um we have to make sure we continue to spray the ball like we did our last two games our last two games we were up right around 20 uh

Sprays a game which we want to get to and tonight we were three for nine which impacted us from the three-point line more than uh more than anything else uh I thought defensively um we did enough to win the game um but uh offensively we just didn’t

Spray the ball you got to give a lot of credit Um to Jaylen man he he’s he’s a hell of a player I I don’t know if Steph maybe I don’t know if we blitzed anybody as much as we did Jaylen tonight tried to send two at him and he still scored 42 points over I think I’m do my math right but

Over 50% from the field I the the rest of the team shot 34% scored 56 points and they shot 21% from the three Jaylen shot 50% from the three and over 50% from the field and we sent the double team at him every single time he

Came off the pick and roll in the second half and and most of the time and not probably half the time or so in the first half um he’s he’s a hell of a player um big game he stepped up in he he really helped them get it done

Tonight uh I I can’t you know be mad at our guy’s effort or anything like that cuz I thought we try to play hard um but uh you know when you when you have a team at 98 points or 96 points whatever it is on 43% you know and we score

91 and one of our big things is spraying the basketball we go three for nine that’s a that’s a big part of our identity that we didn’t bring to the table tonight Mike this felt like playoff basketball and your team seems over the last three games responded really well

Defensively is this sort of what you’ve been asking for the entire season 100% 100% we’re James we’re more than capable and you know again for people to say hey just concentrate on offense you’re offensive team yeah we are but our guys are capable Defenders too when they want

To and they’ve shown it the last three games and you know I we practice offense more than we do defense whether it’s shooting around normal practice or anything I mean we we probably have uh two two defensive drills to four offensive drills every practice and um

But having said that you know I know I knew it would take some time I knew our guys were capable and they’re starting to respond you know we just need to continue to make sure we don’t lose our identity on the offens in the floor too

And part of that is our sprays uh we do a hell of a job moving the basketball in our last two losses I think if Houston was the last loss before this um we Face two physical defensive teams that play the same way and they just dare you to spray the

Basketball and if you don’t it’s going to be a slugfest and anybody can win in a slugfest especially if you’re playing defense the way we are we’ll still give ourselves a chance but we would have had a better chance if we would have sprayed it all night Mike you may be repeating yourself

A little bit here but can you run through for clarification the things that you can live with from tonight’s performance and anything that specifically that you you can’t live with or something maybe not unacceptable as the right word but things that are like okay that that needs to definitely

Be cleaned up no the the biggest thing that needs to be cleaned up is our ability to spray the basketball we got to spray the ball uh especially when you when you play a physical team like Houston like New York that just as soon as the ball touches the paint does this

Uh cuz we’re n it and the crazy part about it we had 26 free throws to they’re 16 so there could have been some calls that have gone our way yeah but I’m sure they felt the same you know so the next order of business is if you’re

Getting a call but it’s not enough now spray it and sometimes that that that means if you’re coming off a pick and roll and the guy pulls in to the guy in front of you pulls in to stop stop you just throw it ahead let that

Guy make make the play or start the domino effect and um you know if you’re rolling and you catch it you’re in traffic spray it if you cut and you catch it you’re in traffic spray it if you you know we they all have a great

Feel of when the def does this now we just got to make sure that we get off of it in a timely manner and guys face the floor the right way to make sure they have targets you know out along the perimeter that’s probably the one area

That that I would say um was disappointing tonight is we didn’t have enough sprays um you you’re going to have breakdowns here and there throughout the course of the game and that’s when you just cover from one another and rotate and communicate and give effort and all that other stuff and

I mean I I thought our guys did you know I thought they did that well enough to win the ball game we just didn’t get it done on the offensive end based on the way that they play play defense we didn’t get it done the right way and

With our sprays and that that’s that’s the tough part and I mean Brunson I mean he he’s he’s hell of a player you know and uh there are some things that we can clean up with him but man he he’s a hell of a player Mike how’ you how do you feel

About the way your guys handled the physicality of this game and and how much um Can a night like this kind of help prepare you for what’s to to come in the weeks ahead I thought our guys did a great job handling it you know um

And for the most part we were pretty good with the officials you know uh you know it’s one of those things where you see some plays out there that you’re like how how can you how can you miss this and but the same breath you

Know like I said we have 26 free throws to they’re 16 and so handling the physicality on both ends of the floor I thought our guys did a a pretty good job with it minus the times that we we could have gotten off the ball with sprays when we hit the

Paint coach what oh go sorry the the pace tonight seemed to play in to New York’s favor what do you feel like you guys could have done to to make it a little faster yeah I I thought we tried to push the basketball you know we kept

Telling them hey get stops get out and go get stops get out and go uh but you know again you got to give them credit they I thought they did a hell of a job getting back in transition too and we didn’t have any easy looks uh in

Transition when we did try to push the pace you know so um that one I probably need to go back and make sure that when I watch the film that I’m I’m I’m feeling like I’m seeing the right thing from the game uh because it was definitely an emphasis of ours is hey

Let’s go let’s be who we are push the Pace push the Pace push the pace and I thought we we tried but again they they they were pretty good in defensive transition coach with with with the lack of sprays is that something you guys are noticing like immediately as it’s going

Or is it more of like a hindsight thing when you see no no we we tell we like I think we were two for five at halftime in sprays and so that meant in the second half we ended up being uh cuz we were three for we were one for one for

Four you know for for a half so we tell them as the game we have somebody that charts it during the game and we remind them doing timeouts and we remind them when we come in at halftime so it’s it’s well known when we’re not getting off

That ball like we should thanks everyone thank you guys Guys

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