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NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: CELTICS VS CAVALIERS

May 22, 2017

Brad Stevens

Boston, Massachusetts: Practice Day

Q. What stood out to you on the film watching it this morning?
BRAD STEVENS: I thought we said it last night: I thought we played with a good amount of purpose, even in the first half when things weren't going our way. I thought our worst six minutes of the game was probably the first six minutes of the third. But for the most part we were really locked in and got a lot of good contributions from a lot of people.

Q. It was a 21-point deficit midway through the third. Where did your guys find resolve at that point because --
BRAD STEVENS: Well, we were down 20 here in late December at the start of the fourth and had a shot to win it. Last year we were down big here and ended up winning the game. In the NBA, these games last forever. There are so many possessions left. If you can cut it to 12 and then get a stop, cut it to nine, get a stop, cut it to seven -- and you feel like those leads can go quick if you play the right way. It's easier said than done. We got some fortunate bounces from them not making shots in the second half. As I told you last night, maybe the law of averages kicked in for us a little. But hey, you have to play really well to have a chance to win.

Q. You talked about how big Marcus was --
BRAD STEVENS: Yeah, he was terrific. He's been so good for us all three years. He brings a competitive spirit of belief that we need and that we lean on and rely on. I think that last night obviously the shot making is what everybody talks about. But he did so many other great things when he was defending multiple positions, multiple actions, posting up for us, got the big offensive rebound kick-out that he kicked out to Al late for a three. He just makes a lot of winning plays.

Q. What does that game do for his confidence going forward?
BRAD STEVENS: I think he's pretty confident. I'm not concerned about his confidence. And rightfully so. When you're a competitor like he is -- I think sometimes we throw around those terms loosely, but he's tough. He is competitive. He's going to give it everything he has. He believes he's out here for all the right reasons. We're glad he's with us.

Q. How much has just his sheer energy sort of infused things?
BRAD STEVENS: Yeah, always has. Always has. A big reason why we brought him off the bench most of the year because you always knew that no matter how you started a game, you had that coming into the game. That's been a great trait of his.

Q. Do you expect to see a difference with LeBron James in Game 4?
BRAD STEVENS: Well, one of the things, as you go back and watch the film, I thought LeBron made a lot of the right plays. When you've got guys that are all on fire the way they are, the right basketball play is to find them. He just made it over and over.

The guy is a tremendous basketball player. He makes the right play over and over, and he thinks the game, he sees the game. He's a really good defender. He can read situations. So I thought he was pretty darned good. But like I said last night, I'm not going to be critical of the best player in the world.

Q. Jonas said he thought you guys kind of gave them too much respect in Games 1 and 2. What did you think changed in your energy and the way you stood up to them?
BRAD STEVENS: I thought the biggest thing was that we played better.

Q. Avery just talked about the FaceTime call after the game with Isaiah and just how happy Isaiah was. He's still a huge part of this team even though he's not here.
BRAD STEVENS: Yeah, I didn't even realize that that had happened until later on. But one of my first text messages I got was from Isaiah. He's hurting not being able to be out there, but he's completely invested, that's for sure.

Q. To follow up on that question about LeBron, Avery indicated that he expects the Cavs to come out with a certain level of purpose in Game 4 that they didn't necessarily have throughout last night's game. What can you say about what you expect from them?
BRAD STEVENS: I think they're champions. They always come out with purpose. They scored 66 on us in the first half. It felt pretty purposeful when it was happening. So I think at the end of the day, we're going to have to take that hit and weather the storm. I thought we weathered it reasonably well all things considered. I thought we played well in the first half, but some of those shots were incredible. We just have to realize it's a long game. We can't get too up or too down. We can't have what happened in Games 1 and 2 where they go on a run and we let it affect our next play. That's the biggest thing.

Q. I know not much time has passed, but is there an update on Isaiah?
BRAD STEVENS: I don't know where he is today, but he's getting looked at today. I'll probably find out later on.

Q. Before the series, the Cavs raved about your ATOs. I'm curious about the thought processes and packages and how many different options do you have and the process that you go through in deciding which plays to run?
BRAD STEVENS: We're in about game 100? That means you watch five times that many games or six times that many games throughout the course of the year all over the league just as you're studying. All you're doing is you're stealing from everybody else and you try to figure out what might work best in certain situations. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

Q. Everybody says that Doc has really good ATOs. Is there anybody in particular that you've stolen from generously?
BRAD STEVENS: I've literally have stolen from everybody. I've said this when I was coaching in college, and especially when you become a head coach and you're responsible for doing some of that stuff, I've learned something from every film I've watched. Here it's like you're getting the Ph.D every time you turn on the tape.

Q. Without giving away too many secrets, how do you pare it down?
BRAD STEVENS: It's about the players making plays. It's not that big of a deal.

Q. Remember Jonas had the kick-out from Avery in the final minute? Avery said that the play was originally prepared for him to drive in the lane. At what point did that play get altered?
BRAD STEVENS: When all four guys were flying at him. That's why you space around him. You try to have shooters all over the floor. We always want layups. We've run that a bunch in the past. Sometimes he's able to turn the corner for a layup; sometimes he's able to make the right read and kick out.

Q. You guys had a healthy dose of post-ups yesterday, whether you had mismatches or not, what did you like about --
BRAD STEVENS: I thought we had to do that. With Isaiah being out, probably a little bit less spread pick-and-roll oriented than we would be normally. We've tried to make a huge emphasis on playing through the post all year with Al as a passer or Smart as a passer. We get some of our better traditional motion or cutting actions when the ball goes in the post. Sometimes the guy that gets it in the post scores, but a lot of times it's to get other actions.

Q. Post-ups are kind of dying a little bit around the league when you think about it, but is there an advantage to it? It sort of turns the defense around a little bit.
BRAD STEVENS: Yeah, we were talking about this a couple weeks ago on the radio. I think because people just tend to look at the post-up as the one-on-one isolation play, I think a lot of teams are using it as a passing play because of the angle at which you can start to cut and do those types of things.

Golden State is probably the best at it, where they throw it in there and slip all those screens and you're sucked on to those shooters and you don't want to help and they get all the dunks. But I think that with Al's ability to pass, with Smart's ability to pass, those are things we've tried to incorporate more of this year. And with this group, without IT, it's one of the things we'll try to do.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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