Gregg Popovich | Speedy Claxton | Tim Duncan | Tony Parker | David Robinson | Kevin Willis

GREGG POPOVICH

Q: They made their run at the end of the first half and you guys made a big surge in the second, what where was this game won and lost?
Popovich: I guess they did make a great run and we made a great run. But from our part, I think that we -- once Timmy went out in the second quarter, they made an 11-2 run and it continued at the start of the third quarter. I thought we just played a little bit unfocused during that period. We stopped getting back on D. Once Timmy left, I didn't think we kept our aggressiveness, that sort of thing and they made a big run.

We called a time-out, talked about it a little bit and I thought they came back and immediately looked like the team that I've coached all year long, as far as the intensity and the defense, the boards and that sort of thing. It got us back in the game.

But shooting was a little bit of a problem. Four of our top six guys were 3 for 30-something and that's going to be tough to win a game if you perform that way. So I would say those were the biggest factors in our demise tonight.

Q: Do you feel good that you're team could shoot below 30 percent and still have one shot to tie the game at the end?
Popovich: At this point in the season, you're not very interested in any sort of moral victory or silver linings. It's a W or it's an L. There were things we could have taken care of during the game that we did not, and they came up with the win.

Q: How do you think that bodes for the rest of the series?
Popovich: I'm not a prognosticator. I don't have a crystal ball. I don't know what the hell is going to happen. I just hope that the good guys win.

Q: Why not use one of best shooters in this game, Steve Kerr on your bench who did a great job against Dallas?
Popovich: I've got to answer that, right? Because I decided to do something else.

Q: Speedy Claxton provided a spark to you guys in the second half, Tony started cold and finished cold, did you consider putting him back in at the end of the game?
Popovich: Sure. Speedy played really well tonight. We agonized over it. We needed to take him out because he was getting dead tired, so he needed to take a break for a couple of minutes and we agonized whether we should go with him or come back with Tony Parker, who has been so good for us in so many games. We just decided he's our starting point guard, who makes big shots and we're going to stick with him through the series, and we wanted to show that confidence in him. That was the reasoning. It was one of those things that could have gone either way.

Q: You guys have kept Jefferson under control for the first three games, but tonight was it what he was doing or what you guys weren't doing?
Popovich: I think that we had -- I think we lost him in the transition more than anything. If you let him get going in the transition, he's going to have a little bit better game. During that period I spoke about earlier, I thought we lost him in that regard.

Q: During one of the crucial time-outs during the end, you came back with the zone defense and if I'm correct, you went away from that and went with the personal defense, talk about that and if you can, also talk about Ginobili; was it a set play for him to get the 3-pointer at the end?
Popovich: Yeah, we went zone on one of the possessions you talked about and it worked out well. The next possession we had, a different group was on the court and we don't feel as comfortable with that group on the court in zone so we went man.

Yeah, at the end we ran a play for Manu. He had a great shot and he missed it.

Q: Did you think Jason had hit the net before the shot?
Popovich: Somebody did hit the net on Manu's shot but it had nothing to do with the shot. Yeah, he did but he missed it anyway. It was short, it just grazed off the front. The guy that hit the net didn't have anything to do with it. Maybe it's a rule or something, I don't know.

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SPEEDY CLAXTON

Q: What happened tonight?
Claxton: You’re not going to have a great game every night. You’re going to have off nights.

Q: Have you ever seen a night where so many shots didn’t fall?
Claxton: We didn’t shoot the ball well. We’ve had good and bad nights in the playoffs. Tonight was a bad night.

Q: Why hasn’t this team played well this series?
Claxton: We haven’t played well all series. We haven’t been able to get consistent play out of the whole team, but once we do that, we should be OK.

Q: Is it a focus thing?
Claxton: I really don’t know what it is. We know that we really haven’t played well, but we’re still finding ways to either win or stay close. Hopefully, we’ll win a few more. We know what we’re capable of, but we just can’t get it done right now.

Q: How much of the team’s struggles is the Spurs and how much is the Nets?
Claxton: It might be a combination of both. I’m not going to discredit them because they’re a good team. I think most of it is us.

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TIM DUNCAN

Q: This is one of those games that could have gone either way --
Duncan: Yeah, great effort. They played well. They did what they wanted to do and came out here and made a run at the beginning. I thought we did a great job to get back into it. We had an opportunity to win down the stretch, we just couldn't make plays.

Q: It seems like you guys have yet to put together a solid San Antonio Spurs game. How much of that is the Nets, how much of it is the Spurs?
Duncan: It's got to be all Nets. They are playing good defense. We have a team in front of us and they are not going to get out of our way and let us do whatever we want to do, so a lot of credit to them.

Q: It got a little bit nasty at times tonight, is it starting to heat up a little bit?
Duncan: Yeah, it's the Finals. They were on the verge of going down 3-1. They had to do everything they had to do.

Q: Are you sensing bad blood?
Duncan: What's bad blood? I don't know what bad blood. We are both playing hard and we are competing for a title. That takes some competitiveness. Both teams are competing.

Q: They got into their transition game a lot more than they have in the series, what have you got to do to get back in the game?
Duncan: It hurt us for a little while there. I thought we cleaned it all up in the second half, a couple long rebounds, a couple turnovers and they got into the open court. So it's about taking care of the ball.

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TONY PARKER

Q: What happened tonight?
Parker: We were just missing shots. The ball just didn’t want to go tonight. I think we shot under 30 percent, and it’s pretty hard to win a ballgame when you shoot like that. We didn’t play well. We didn’t compete for 48 minutes. We missed a lot of layups. We just have to come back strong next game. Hopefully, we’ll shoot the ball a little better.

Q: Was it hard to keep your composure with such a ragged game?
Parker: Yeah, but when you’re in the heat of the battle, you just have to fight through it. We can’t let a game like this affect us. We have to come back strong the next game.

Q: What happened on the last play?
Parker: I thought we executed great. It was a good play. Manu was wide open, made a great pump fake, great shot, you can’t ask for more. It was just great execution.

Q: Did you think there was goaltending on that last play?
Parker: I don’t know. It’s kind of hard.

Q: Coach Popovich went with Speedy Claxton for an extended period tonight. Did you want to get back in there and play through your struggles?
Parker: That’s coach’s decision. You can’t argue with that. I’m not going to argue with a coach’s decision.

Q: Are there any moral victories, being that you guys played bad but still had a chance?
Parker: We’re still going to fight. Even though we played terrible, shot the ball terrible, we still had a chance.

Q: Were you expecting Jason Kidd to try to back you down a lot more like he did tonight?
Parker: Not really. The first three games he’s done that. In Game 2, he posted up a lot and scored a lot of points. It didn’t surprise me at all.

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DAVID ROBINSON

Q: Was that about as physical a game as the Nets have played so far this series, and also, did the refs let them play that way a little more?
Robinson: Yeah, it was a very physical game. You could say that. I think in the series, though, they played pretty physical. They have done a good job of that.

You know, the game has been about defense, about making stops. I think both teams have been very aggressive. We're obviously used to scoring a lot more points, getting the ball in the hole and they are doing a good job defensively. We obviously need to be a lot more effective. We are not going to win games if we get, you know, all of our best scorers scoring three points, going 1 for 9, that's not going to win games. We need to move that ball around, get a good balance scoring, get some of these guys involved in our offense, and just make shots. We had plenty of good looks tonight. Early on, we had a lot of good layups and stuff but we got blocked and didn't get in the basket and it makes it too hard. If you have good shots, you've got to knock them down and we didn't.

Q: They had some success tonight limiting Tony Parker, how were they able to do that?
Robinson: That's a good question. I don't know. I'd have to watch the film.

I think we didn't do a very good job of getting the ball up and down the floor. That's where Tony really excels, in the open court, making good decisions. Obviously, early in the game, we got into our turnover thing again, did some turnovers.

We got a lot of buckets, inside opportunities so Tony was not involved early on. But Tony has to do a better job of staying involved in the game and picking and choosing his moments and I don't think Tony did a very good job of that tonight. He's so talented, he's got to understand, he plays a big role for us so he has to come in there and make good things happen. You don't make good things happen by necessarily standing out there and taking ill-advised jump shots. You make good things happen by playing that good D and making good transition in those situations, and we didn't do a good job of that tonight.

Q: As the Admiral of "Old Man Brigade," you and Kevin Willis brought a lot to the table, but don't you think Steve Kerr should have been in there to take some open shots?
Robinson: You know, that's a coaching decision right there. Yeah, I've got a lot of confidence in those guys to shoot those shots. They may miss a few of them but I always feel like they are going to come back. I feel like Jack is going to come back and make some shots. Manu, he makes those big shots down the stretch, I always think he's going to knock them down.

Steve is an unbelievable shooter and a great player and you've got to make your decisions when you bring him in. That's really kind of a coaching decision there. I was disappointed tonight that we didn't get the ball in the basket like we could have, but, yeah, maybe he did make a move like that early on. But we didn't tonight. We still had good opportunities, still had a chance to win the game and a few things kind of didn't go our way down the stretch. It was a tough ending for us.

Q: I know you were not on the court but the last minute, the two offensive rebounds, what did you see happen on those plays?
Robinson: The first offensive rebound, they just really outhustled us. On the second offensive rebound, we had two guys fighting for the ball and we kind of gave it back to them. That is extremely disappointing, understanding how important that board is. I mean, we just lost the offensive rebound to put ourselves in the toughest position, and then you give the second one away, you just feel like kicking yourself, like, what are we doing? Like, do we want to win this game? Is there some kind of urgency out there? We had opportunities, two straight opportunities, we make a stop, you don't come up with the ball. That's not good basketball.

And so obviously we are pretty frustrated with ourselves a little bit because there are a lot of things we could have done better. I give the Nets a lot of credit, they did everything they needed to do to win this game. They got those two big offensive boards. They did everything they needed to do. It's a good win for them.

Q: Are they starting to match up with you size-wise? You had the blocked shots, they had that advantage of the blocked shots, they had those two offensive boards, what do you think of that?
Robinson: They did a great job, there's no question. Obviously tonight, we got our big guys into foul trouble and that really puts us in a tough spot if we're getting into foul trouble.

So we are going to have to be a little bit smarter that way. They did a great job matching up with us tonight. They had the advantage in a lot of ways, and especially like I said, when we are shuffling guys around and when Malik has a tough night like he had tonight, we don't have a whole lot of options.

Q: This late in the year, you know your team pretty well, what do you have to do to regain your focus to really get in on this thing?
Robinson: I think we just have to understand what this game is about. It's a simple game. You've got two teams that are good defensive teams, two teams that are really grind-it-out teams, and for us, the key is just to play smart basketball. I think that's where we really get back to being ourselves. I mean, we have little stretches of six or seven or eight minutes where we do actually play pretty good basketball, but it takes us being down 15 before we realize, you know, the urgency.

I think the next game we just have to come in at the beginning of the game and understand, it's going to be a 48-minute game and let's do this, 48 minutes. Let's play good basketball for 48 minutes. I don't think we have done that yet. I know we can. I've seen us do it. We've been doing it through most of the playoffs. We've had our moments where we've kind of gone and played a half or whatever, but that's part of the battle of trying to become a champion, when you overcome some of that inconsistency.

We've got young players, a little bit of inconsistency or whatever, but when you can battle that and be more steady, that's what we are trying to do, trying to become the champion.

Q: Throughout the playoffs, you lost a game and then you won the next one. Today, when you were down 15, time-out, I guess Popovich was yelling at the guys, is it possible that your guys are playing better when Pop is mad at you?
Robinson: (Laughing).

Pop is mad most of the time. I think that's just his Serbian heritage. That's from him, not from me.

He has a great sense for the situation. He's done a good job this year of balancing that out. He doesn't go crazy all the time. Before he used to get crazy a lot more. He knows. He does a good job of getting us fired up, getting us motivated. Tonight, he did, he got into us a little bit and then we responded extremely well.

But it shouldn't take that for us to play well and that's what everybody in our locker room needs to understand. It shouldn't take that for us to play well. We need to be self-motivated and keep our poise without somebody getting in our face and yelling at us.

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KEVIN WILLIS

Q: Was their aggressive play tonight a direct result of their backs being against the wall?
Willis: Yes. We expected them to come out and play a little more aggressive, more physical, because when your back is against the wall, you don’t want to come out passive. They did what they had to do to get the win.

Q: Is it hard to win a game when you shoot 29 percent from the field?
Willis: Yeah, it’s tough, especially when your defense is not in high gear. We’d pick it up, and then it would go back down. We weren’t consistent with our effort in defense.

Q: Was it goaltending on the last play?
Willis: The ref called it like he saw it. We can’t cry or say anything. We lost the game. That’s the bottom line. We will prepare ourselves tomorrow and come up with a better effort on Friday.

Q: Did the refs call it a little closer tonight?
Willis: It was called the way they called it. We’re not going to cry about that. We’re not going to complain. We’re going to come out Friday, and hopefully all the cylinders will be clicking.

Q: How do you explain a shooting night like that?
Willis: It happens. That’s basketball. Some nights you’re going to shoot 60 percent and some nights you’re going to shoot 25 percent. We just have to bounce back. On Friday, we’ll shoot the ball better.

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