HEAD COACH BILLUPS
On tonight’s game…
“That was an incredible win for us today. Things came together—we just played extremely hard on the defensive end, and we finally started getting some shots to go. Nowadays when you get shots to go, it helps the defense. If people are playing with confidence, everybody’s kind of getting and moving the ball, sharing the ball. There were times out there when it looked like we may have had six guys on the floor. People were just—so many different efforts defensively. So, it was fun, it was fun to be a part of.”
On showing everything previously critiqued last game…
“We played as good as we could play, to be honest. I mean, we made shots, defensively we did a really good job; we took care of the basketball, we were focused in on all of our coverages, and man it was just beautiful. It was beautiful not only for me, but for the guys to see what we’re capable of when we’re focused, right? I mean, that’s a championship caliber team that is hungry.”
On advantages of tonight’s game…
“Obviously, we caught them on a back-to-back; that’s an advantage. It’s one of the advantages of being here in Portland—one is our crowd, two; where we are located, whenever we catch somebody on a back-to-back. I mean, it’s a lot of long flights coming here. So, I’m proud of these dudes, man. We’ve been working extremely hard. We have shown some spurts obviously, and today we did for the entire game.”
On cleaning up from the Kings game…
“I feel like we did clean some things up. Like I said after Game 1, I felt like we played hard enough to win the game. We just didn’t shoot the ball well. I thought we generated good shots tonight, we made shots, and defensively, man, we were just all over the place.
One thing we haven’t done a great job of is having a good start. Let’s focus in on our good starts. We focused in on sprinting back—getting back in transition, which has kind of an issue for us. We’ve been a poor transition defense team early this season. So, I said if we can do that, if we can load our defense up and get back, then we have a better chance of stopping them, or containing them at least.
A lot of times [when on defense] they got some lobs there, they got some layups there which happens, but a lot of times we messed up that coverage, but we were playing so hard. This is what I preach to our team all the time—when you’re playing extremely hard you can mess up some coverages, but those multiple efforts cover up for some of those things, and I thought tonight we did that.”
On CJ McCollum…
“CJ has been great, man. Tonight he held us. He continued to stay aggressive. We were spreading the floor, and we were able to take advantage of the coverage they played on him, and he stayed aggressive. Like, there was a time or two when I wanted to get him out of there,
because he had been running kind of long. And I just kept saying, “Alright, next play,” because he keeps making the shot. “Maybe I’ll get him next play.” And he just kept going. CJ has been, to me, he’s been really focused—he asks more questions than anybody on the team in practice and coverages and offenses, I mean he’s always asking questions trying to pick it up. It was good to see him continue to play well.”
On Billups wanting Nassir Little to be hardest playing guy on the court…
“Absolutely. I mean you look at the effort Nas is putting out there. He’s playing so hard, and I told him, I said, “First of all, you got to be the hardest guy playing out there, and then we can start talking about other things.” You know, slowing down a bit, playing a little smarter, paying attention to coverages, but that’s all secondary. I just want him to play hard, use his God-given talent and gifts that he has, and then we’ll work on all that other stuff later.”
On enjoying the moment…
“Yes, yes I was, I was definitely able to enjoy it. It’s good to see all those guys play well. You see them every single day. At practice, these guys are there early, they’re working their behinds off. And you talk about some of the guys that aren’t really in the rotation, and for them to have the opportunity to play and play well, you know, because their families and moms and grandmas—everybody’s watching them play, so this is a great moment for these guys to definitely enjoy.”
On first coaching win…
“This game goes up at the top, at the top of my accomplishments in my trophy room. I mean, that ball will be right there. First time getting a win, playing with a team that really just believes in me and what myself and my staff is trying to do, so that’s big time for me.”