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NBA PLAYOFFS ROUND ONE: TRAIL BLAZERS vs WARRIORSApril 19, 2017Draymond GreenJaVale McGeeOakland, California: Game Two Trail Blazers - 81, Warriors - 110 Q. Draymond, you obviously knew with Durant out you needed some other guys stepping forward. How would you describe JaVale's game tonight? DRAYMOND GREEN: It's kind of awkward with him sitting right here. No, it was amazing, the energy that he brought off the bench, obviously, it showed up in the points. With him being there live right at the rim for us, it was kind of like a bail out. You get it in trouble, and he goes to the rim and goes to get it. It was more than that. It was offensive rebounds. It was a great post move. It was the blocks. It was the defense and the pick-and-roll coverage. I mean, he was amazing all over the court for us tonight. It gave us a huge lift off the bench. Q. I wanted to ask you about Patrick McCaw. Stepping into Durant's position, also had to do a little bit with Sean Livingston too. You looked pretty excited when he drove the key for that one lay-up and was barking for a foul. Could you talk about his performance? DRAYMOND GREEN: I actually thought he was blocking on CJ, that's why I was so excited. It's actually the first time I've ever seen him show any emotion though, so that was pretty good, I thought. But he was great tonight. He shot the ball when he had shots. He drove closeouts hard and got to the paint. He used his athleticism. He was great on the defensive end. Pat's one of those guys where he doesn't show that he's overly confident, because he'll never say anything, but he's one of those guys that you don't have to instill confidence in. You feel like, oh, it's the NBA. I'm here. I should be here and, I want to do what I do. It's a great thing. He stepped in great for us. He was big for us tonight. Obviously, you don't expect him to come in and beat Kevin Durant. But he came in was solid, made plays for ourselves, made plays for others, and he got a lot of deflections on the defensive end which was key also. Q. JaVale, Lillard was just in here and said we cannot let him impact the game the way he did. How much pride do you take in the way you're contributing on both ends right now? You guys going up there with a 2-0 lead? JAVALE McGEE: I mean, I took a lot of pride in it. We've really been harping on taking our defense, and I've really been trying to step up on that. So I feel like we did a great job tonight. I feel like we have to continue to do that, especially in games 3 and 4. Q. JaVale, can you just talk about your efficiency? Obviously, seven of seven tonight. Do you feel like you're feeling this offense as good as you have all season right now? JAVALE McGEE: Yeah, definitely. That's my whole thing. I just try to be efficient out there. I don't try to do too much. I just try to do what's necessary for me in the minutes that I'm out there, and I feel like I'm doing a good job at that. Q. Draymond, did you ever think that you'd see Klay Thompson rise up for a block at the rim like that? DRAYMOND GREEN: No. It was pretty amazing though. For him to go vertical and then just block the shot like that was a pretty monstrous block. You know, it was fitting that he got a three at the end. That's what Klay's all about. He's about getting his shots up. But he made the defensive play, and he was rewarded on the other end. But it was definitely an amazing block. He snuck over to help. Good thing about that block was Klay blocked it, but if he didn't, JaVale was about to block it, so it was a pretty unique play. Q. After that second quarter foul by Meyers Leonard. It looked like you were telling officials, if that had been mow, me it would have been a flagrant foul. What was your message there on the line? DRAYMOND GREEN: You heard it perfectly, brother. Maybe a two, but it's okay. Life goes on. Q. Draymond, CJ and Damian just got 23 points. What did you do for defense? DRAYMOND GREEN: Just not let them get in their comfort zone. When you let them come out and get easy things from the beginning, they get into rhythm. They're just as tough to stop as anybody in the league. But we came out from the jump. We were up on the pick-and-roll, started out with Zaza, we didn't let them get to the left-hand as much as they wanted to, as much as we did in the first Game 1. And they fought us from the beginning. As opposed to all of a sudden third quarter, then you start to apply more pressure. We did it from the jump tonight. It had an effect on them. I think they were a little tired from Game 1. They both exhausted a lot of energy, but that's the series. You've got to give our guards a lot of credit, our bigs a lot of credit on what did to stop those guys. You can't expect them to hold them to 23 points every night, but you can't give them 75 either. So it will probably be somewhere in the middle of that, and that's fine. But we've just got to keep trying to make it tough on them. Q. JaVale, you come from a strong blood line of basketball players. Your dad, George Montgomery played for University of Illinois, and your mom was a coach at Sacramento High before you went off to UNR, could you talk a little bit about that? Was that an incentive or kind of put a chip on your shoulder that you want to keep that tradition going? JAVALE McGEE: Yeah, definitely. I basically have a basketball family, so it was just instilled in me. Basketball is basically all we know. I feel like that's what we need to do to be able to be a part of the McGee family, you've got to be athletic, and you've got to be running the floor. You've got to be doing something. My sister's 6'7" and she can dunk. So it's just crazy. It's just in my family to play basketball. Q. (Indiscernible)? JAVALE McGEE: My mother definitely was still hard working me, especially on the basketball. I think it was sixth grade, and I had a bad game. She had me up at 6:00 a.m. running around, running around in the snow and boots, like working out. It was like it's sixth grade. What are we doing right now? But it worked, obviously. Q. JaVale, you talked about stepping up on pick-and-rolls earlier. I'm wondering what coaches and players have been helpful for your defense this season? JAVALE McGEE: I like Deron Adams, he really hurts on the pick and roll and defensive strategy. So Deron Adams. Q. Draymond, people talk about you and K.D. and Steph and Klay as All-Stars. But on a night like tonight when the offense is coming and going, what's it mean to have 33 points from JaVale, and Zaza, and David off the bench, the bigs? DRAYMOND GREEN: It means a lot. A lot of people do talk about the four of us. But one thing that's constant in this organization is everybody. The strength in the numbers. You know, the depth that we rely on so heavily throughout the course of the year and through the Playoffs, and it's showing up tonight. Steph didn't have a huge game. I didn't have a huge game. Klay didn't have a huge game, yet we were able to put the game together that we did tonight. You know, it's a testament to that depth. We won almost by 30 points without anyone having a huge game. But everybody did a little bit of something. That's especially important with K.D. out. He's such an important and huge force for us. On the offense and defensive end, especially the offensive end, when he goes out, you usually always say, oh, man, Steph's going to have 30, and Klay's going to have 30. But that didn't happen tonight, but all the other guys stepped up. Everybody contributed to this win. It's great to be able to win games like that. Sometimes stars don't have big games and it's tough to win. That's one thing that with our team we always say no matter what, we can go out there and get a win, and it showed tonight. Q. What were you thinking when you heard for sure that Durant wasn't going to play tonight? Do you think you sent a message to Portland or the rest of the league that you can win a game by 29 with Durant out and some of the other stars not having a huge night? DRAYMOND GREEN: No, I don't think it sends much of a message. One thing we know is it's one game. That doesn't say much to Portland. They beat us in game 2 without K.D. They're still going to come out and play hard in Game 3 and give all they've got, whether we have K.D. or not, and that's for everybody else in the league. At the same time, it's a confidence booster for us to be able to go out there and win like that without him. We don't plan on being without him for long. But at at the same time, things do happen, like the calf. And, you know, he goes down or anyone else, other guys got to be ready to step up and contribute. That was the game tonight, everybody stepped up and contributed and we were able to win the way we did. Q. Draymond, you led the team with ten assists. You guys had another game over 30 assists. Is it something with you from the forward position where you have a little more advantage being able to get the ball around to your teammates? DRAYMOND GREEN: I mean, yeah, I think that definitely helps our team. It helps the flow of our offense. But at the same time guys still got to make shots. We had guys knocking shots down, and you just try to get them the ball in the position where they're going to be successful, and they've got to do the rest. One thing we preach is ball movement and player movement. Guys are flying around and cutting, and it's whoever, not just myself, but whoever has the ball, it's your job to find him and try to help them be in a position to get the bucket. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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