HEAD COACH TERRY STOTTS
“I was really proud of our team tonight. Obviously, we struggled offensively most of the night and just kept hanging around, still competed defensively and put ourselves in a position to win a game once we started making some shots. Obviously, Dame’s offense was big. Ed Davis was a big boost in the second half. Shabazz came off the bench – our three guard line-up was pretty effective in making plays and creating for each other. All in all, like I said, especially the way the offense was the first half, it’s good to get one.”
On McCollum:
“CJ, Dame, the guys – even though they were struggling at times, they made big shots for us, big plays. When we had the three guard lineup, that put him on Wiggins for a good portion and I thought he really competed defensively.”
Did you have a feeling Lillard was going to get it going?
“I usually feel that way. Both he and CJ, I mean every time – honestly, when those guys are open, you think it’s going to go in no matter what they’ve done before. And the good thing is that they think that too.”
What does it say about the team that you had to grind and hang in until the shots came late in the game?
“That they have a lot of confidence and they understand we may not have won this game earlier in the season. We were able to fight through and hang with it defensively when things weren’t going our way offensively, and then having the belief that it was going to break at some point.”
On Ed Davis playing a long stretch in the second half:
“Yeah, he played a quarter and a half in the second half. He was so good defensively, rebounding, setting screens on the offensive end, I was going to go back with Nurk but Ed was just too effective.”
DAMIAN LILLARD
“I think we’ve been playing good basketball, playing hard, playing together. Everybody’s been locked in at shootarounds and practices. We’ve just been sharp mentally. I think tonight was another game we were sharp mentally to start the game. First two and a half, three quarters, we couldn’t buy a basket. We missed a lot of shots but we stayed with it. We kept grinding defensively and when the shots started to fall because we stayed in it, we was able to pull another one out but I think it showed the growth. We showed our growth tonight shooting under 40 percent for a long time and still being able to beat a really good team.”
Coach said you might not have won this game earlier in the season:
“Oh, we wouldn’t have for sure. We would have lost that game.”
On struggles early in the game:
“I mean, I was just missing. I was missing a lot of shots short. Kept hitting the front of the rim. I knew when it was leaving my hand, it felt good, I just knew I had to shoot the ball a little bit higher and I really wasn’t worried about it honestly. I knew I was going to keep applying pressure over the course of the game and eventually it was going to fall, and that’s exactly what happened.”
Were you aware of their history of losing leads late in games and tiring?
“I mean, I’ve seen them do it a couple times but we didn’t talk about what they typically do one time in our huddles. It was just like, the shot’s going to fall, keep working defensively, keep playing hard, keep playing physical and the shot’s going to fall. We kept doing that and when we continued to get stops and shots started to fall, that’s when we took over the game.”
What about earlier season struggles helped for situations like tonight?
“I think it was all a part of our growth. I think over the course of the season, some teams get better and some teams don’t. Some teams figure it out and some teams don’t. Historically, we’ve been a team that as the season goes on, we have ups and downs and then it clicks and we figure it out and we start playing better. I think this year, we’re at a point where things that would have happened earlier on in this season aren’t happening anymore. I think that’s a sign of a team that’s maturing, a team that’s growing and getting better, and that’s leading to us winning game.”