LOS ANGELES CLIPPERS MEDIA CONFERENCE

June 16, 2021

Paul George

Postgame Press Conference

Los Angeles Clippers 119, Utah Jazz 111

Q. Tonight you had a stat line nobody in franchise history has had and you're one game away from going nowhere where this franchise has been. I want to talk to you about seizing the moment, what that means to you; Coach Lue said he had that conversations with the team earlier today. Talk about that conversations seizing the moment and what that meant?

PAUL GEORGE: It was no secret. I knew I had to be big tonight and got to be big going forward. It was just no secret coming into this, and you know, I just first put faith in God, believed in myself. My teammates trusted me. T-Lue trusted me. And you know, I thought we just lived in the moment and we just played our hearts out tonight.

Q. Ty said in the morning shoot around, "T, I got this." What was your reaction what Kawhi told you guys that he wasn't going to be able to play and you might be moving forward without him, at least for this series?

PAUL GEORGE: Oh, man, it was a blow. It was a tough blow. But you know, at the end of the day, we don't want nothing but the best for Kawhi. It's a positive; he can get some rest. Hopefully we can hold it down. But it's a positive. You know, he's got a new baby boy here. A lot of positives, a lot of love for him and his family.

We just got to do what we do. We got to come together. Our season is alive because of his shouldering of all the work that he's done, and so we've got to hold it together and continue to keep this boat afloat until he returns.

Q. You know, Ty has talked a lot about trusting you and showing you that trust. You mentioned that they trusted you all season. How important is that for and you what has that meant to you that your coach and your teammates have shown you that kind of trust this season, especially tonight?

PAUL GEORGE: It's everything. It's everything. You know, I know I'm not going to be perfect. But T-Lue has trusted me in every situation. It's a beautiful thing. You know, I learn from my mistakes. I'll get better along the way but he's allowed me to make his takes and grow from it and he's done it all season long. He's continuing to trust me and the team's trusting me. I've got to go out there and play and just continue to be me.

Q. Is this what Playoff P looks like?

PAUL GEORGE: Sure.

Q. Looked like you were enjoying some back and forth with the Jazz fans. What did that mean to you given the dominant performance you had and after hearing some of the jeers earlier in the series?

PAUL GEORGE: I mean, you love it. You love it. As hostile as it is, as much as they are against me, they are against me for the right reasons. They love their team. They are passionate, community passionate state of their basketball. It gets no better when it comes to that energy and as loud as this crowd gets. They are up there with the best of them. It's fun. I enjoy it. I look forward to it. It's a pleasure to be able to play in front of these fans.

Q. You discussed the trust with you and Ty; how much trust do you have to put into the game plan, especially with the Jazz are hitting 17 threes in the first half and guys are close. How did you trust your teammates, trust yourself, trust the coaching staff, the game plan, that everything is going to work out in the end?

PAUL GEORGE: Yeah, we had to stick with it. They came out hot. Only thing we were thinking, that they can't sustain it. At one point they shot 30 or 37 of their attempts or something like that. So most of their shots were threes. We just knew we had to weather it. At some point hopefully we could cool them down. But we couldn't rely on that. We had to come back and attack them on the other end and be aggressive. That's really what it came down to.

And so we were able to make plays. We were able to keep the tempo going, push the pace. Mo was phenomenal tonight. Reggie was phenomenal. T-Mann, big moments defensively, offensively. In this case oh defensively. It was just a great team, group, team effort win. They just made my job easy tonight.

Q. Ty has talked all season long about staying poised. What does he do for you guys, or how does he sort of instill that in you and what do you see from him?

PAUL GEORGE: T-Lue is a pretty even-keel dude. He's split right down the middle, never up, never down. And so we take his identity throughout the game, a game of runs. We never get rattled. We stay poised and we stay right down the middle. We take after his identity. It was great. He just keeps us going. He keeps us going. Again, just positive, and he allows guys to just be themselves, play their games and that's the reason why this team and individuals have been so successful under his leadership.

Q. Just with the way that you talked about how you knew you needed to step up in this game, it was a hostile environment, you weathered the storm and you did it, you were fantastic. Is there anything that you learned about yourself tonight? I know the guys trust you, but for you personally, what did you learn?

PAUL GEORGE: Not much, not anything that I didn't know already. I've been in Indiana where I had to lead a franchise. You know, and so the beauty here is I get to do that with one of the best in the world in Kawhi. You know, now Kawhi is down. It was just that mindset being back in Indy having to set the tone and come out and lead a ballclub.

That's really the mindset I came out with. It was nothing that I had to prove. It was nothing that I had to be surprised about myself. I just dug into a place that I've been already in my career, and again, it just came down to trust. Everybody just allowed me to lead and they kept pushing me. They just kept me into a great mental space.

Q. As someone who covered you in Indianapolis and remembers you there, what do you remember about that? It felt like to me when you were there, there was a lot of sort of, hey, I'm young and anything is possible and let's figure out what this is all about. What do you remember from that time and those playoff series?

PAUL GEORGE: Yeah, you know, I think back then it was more so just playing off of drilling, playing off of athleticism; and whereas up to this point, because of those moments, because of the matchups against LeBron, playing against a tough New York team, playing against or battling against Atlanta, battling against Washington, because of those matchups as a young guy. It helped me mentally just to grow into a leader.

As a young guy, the vets allowed me to lead. Coming into tonight, that's really where my mindset was. I dug into that space of coming in trying to lead the team. Being down a big piece that's irreplaceable, I knew I had to step in and fill some of the holes. That's just what the mindset was coming into tonight.

Q. Was there a particular game from back in those Pacers days that sort of sticks with you as your -- your favorite Pacers playoff performance?

PAUL GEORGE: There's a lot. There was a lot. There was a lot of special moments of growth. Mostly it was the Toronto Raptors matchup where I thought I really grew as a leader. That was probably one of my best playoff series where I just gave everything I had every possession.