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HEAD COACH TERRY STOTTS
What did you think of Lillard tonight?
“He reminded me of Damian Lillard. He had a good flow offensively. He made big plays for us obviously down the stretch. I thought he played in a really good rhythm all night. It’s kind of the way he’s been playing in preseason. He’s healthy, he feels good. I thought he managed the game well. Obviously his stat line speaks for itself.”
What happened in the third quarter?
“Well, it was a little bit of us and them. They shoot 15 for 20 in the quarter. I thought they got to the paint a little bit too much more than anything else. We gave up I think 16 points in the paint in the first half and 22 in the third quarter. Their penetration hurt us. They were able to dump passes off to their bigs. We just weren’t able to control the ball as much as we needed to.”
How would you describe Vonleh’s play?
“Solid, solid. It’s easy to look at his 5 for 5 and he’s making shots but I thought defensively he was okay. Rebounding, he didn’t get a lot of rebounds but rebounding wasn’t a problem tonight. It was a good performance.”
How do you feel about getting the win in the opener?
“We’re not going to have any easy ones, or very many easy ones. It’s tough to win in this league. I’m glad we defended the way we did in the fourth quarter. Obviously we scored some points as well, but we have to be consistently better defensively. Winning at home is going to be important and winning a game against a division team is important, so it feels good.”
DAMIAN LILLARD
“We knew coming in that they were a capable team. They defend well. They play hard every possession. They can offensive rebound. They’ve got some guys that can get it going. But we made some mistakes on the defensive end, some of it had to do with how alert we were in our coverages. We had some communication issues, but the most important thing is we got the job done, and I’m proud of that.”
You looked aggressive:
“Yeah, coming off of a lot of the pick and rolls, I noticed that their big was back, he was back in the paint. A couple times I was able to give him a hesitation to get him to come forward and get to the rim. Other times he was back and I was able to pull up. So with those coverages, I felt like the way that we started to move the ball and make the defense react, once we got back to the pick and roll, we were able to get good looks. It just came down to if we were going to get stops and then score, because we could get shots that we wanted but we weren’t getting enough stops. Once we got stops, we continued to get good shots and that’s how we were able to get it done.”
On keeping the home opener winning streak going:
“We’ve got such a great crowd. Even moments tonight where they kind of had momentum, I could just head the crowd itching to get involved, getting loud cheering. That’s what we needed. We needed that pick-me-up at points in the game and with a streak that long – the longest in the NBA – you want it to keep going and I was proud that we were able to do that tonight.”
On MVP talk and tonight’s performance:
“This game isn’t going to win me MVP…. I think that people talk about what Steve Kerr said, and then they asked me and I said I wanted to be MVP and it seemed like I was seeing it everywhere. But the most important thing is your actions. I spent a lot of time this summer working on my game and trying to be a better player. We had a great camp. Our team competed really hard. Guys made it hard for me in camp. We fouled each other all through camp, it was a physical camp. So I feel prepared. The best way to show that I really mean that is by going out there and playing like it, and tonight was a good start.”
What did you think of Lillard tonight?
“He reminded me of Damian Lillard. He had a good flow offensively. He made big plays for us obviously down the stretch. I thought he played in a really good rhythm all night. It’s kind of the way he’s been playing in preseason. He’s healthy, he feels good. I thought he managed the game well. Obviously his stat line speaks for itself.”
What happened in the third quarter?
“Well, it was a little bit of us and them. They shoot 15 for 20 in the quarter. I thought they got to the paint a little bit too much more than anything else. We gave up I think 16 points in the paint in the first half and 22 in the third quarter. Their penetration hurt us. They were able to dump passes off to their bigs. We just weren’t able to control the ball as much as we needed to.”
How would you describe Vonleh’s play?
“Solid, solid. It’s easy to look at his 5 for 5 and he’s making shots but I thought defensively he was okay. Rebounding, he didn’t get a lot of rebounds but rebounding wasn’t a problem tonight. It was a good performance.”
How do you feel about getting the win in the opener?
“We’re not going to have any easy ones, or very many easy ones. It’s tough to win in this league. I’m glad we defended the way we did in the fourth quarter. Obviously we scored some points as well, but we have to be consistently better defensively. Winning at home is going to be important and winning a game against a division team is important, so it feels good.”
DAMIAN LILLARD
“We knew coming in that they were a capable team. They defend well. They play hard every possession. They can offensive rebound. They’ve got some guys that can get it going. But we made some mistakes on the defensive end, some of it had to do with how alert we were in our coverages. We had some communication issues, but the most important thing is we got the job done, and I’m proud of that.”
You looked aggressive:
“Yeah, coming off of a lot of the pick and rolls, I noticed that their big was back, he was back in the paint. A couple times I was able to give him a hesitation to get him to come forward and get to the rim. Other times he was back and I was able to pull up. So with those coverages, I felt like the way that we started to move the ball and make the defense react, once we got back to the pick and roll, we were able to get good looks. It just came down to if we were going to get stops and then score, because we could get shots that we wanted but we weren’t getting enough stops. Once we got stops, we continued to get good shots and that’s how we were able to get it done.”
On keeping the home opener winning streak going:
“We’ve got such a great crowd. Even moments tonight where they kind of had momentum, I could just head the crowd itching to get involved, getting loud cheering. That’s what we needed. We needed that pick-me-up at points in the game and with a streak that long – the longest in the NBA – you want it to keep going and I was proud that we were able to do that tonight.”
On MVP talk and tonight’s performance:
“This game isn’t going to win me MVP…. I think that people talk about what Steve Kerr said, and then they asked me and I said I wanted to be MVP and it seemed like I was seeing it everywhere. But the most important thing is your actions. I spent a lot of time this summer working on my game and trying to be a better player. We had a great camp. Our team competed really hard. Guys made it hard for me in camp. We fouled each other all through camp, it was a physical camp. So I feel prepared. The best way to show that I really mean that is by going out there and playing like it, and tonight was a good start.”
