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NBA FINALS: CLEVELAND VS GOLDEN STATEJune 11, 2017Draymond GreenOakland, California: Practice Day Q. Neither team has clinched on their home court during this rivalry. How special would that be? DRAYMOND GREEN: Winning a championship is special in itself. Obviously being able to win in front of your home crowd, I've never experienced it -- I'm sure it's a great feeling. But you just want to win. Obviously, this is our second opportunity to close this thing out and you don't want to keep letting the series prolong. So you have to come out with a killer instinct and a punch-face mentality. Q. What's it like to have a second chance at a Game 5? DRAYMOND GREEN: It's great. I don't think too much about it. It's just the next game in line. Close-out games are the hardest ones, so just excited about the opportunity. Q. Why are close-out games harder? DRAYMOND GREEN: The intensity level rises. When a team's back is against the ball, they're going to come out and give everything they got. It's natural for you to look up and see the finish line right there, and you tend to focus on that instead of the task at hand. We know that, we understand that, and we're looking forward to trying to play our best game of the series tomorrow. Q. This whole team has taken nothing for granted this year after what happened last year. Do you sense that that kind of renewed that attitude after the loss the other night? DRAYMOND GREEN: Absolutely. We won three games in a row in The Finals, 15 in a row overall in the Playoffs, you just think it's going to happen. Then all of a sudden you get smacked in the face and it's like: Whoa. You remember what can be, what can happen. So it's great for us to lock back in and come out with that same focus that we came out with earlier in the season. Q. Is it shocking that they came out with so much force? DRAYMOND GREEN: No, not at all. Didn't expect anything less. Q. Did you expect the same kind of response from your guys here? DRAYMOND GREEN: Definitely. We're competitors. We're a championship team. So definitely. Q. The stuff you say, do you ever think you shouldn't have said it? DRAYMOND GREEN: Absolutely not. Because everything I say, I know what I'm saying. When I say something, I've thought about what I'm going to say before I say it. So, no, I never look at something and say, no, I shouldn't have said that. Because I'm a lot smarter than people think. When I say something, I've already thought about how I was going to say it. So absolutely not. Q. I know emotions were running high the other night. What's the gain of bashing Cleveland fans? DRAYMOND GREEN: I didn't bash them. I just gave my thoughts. Q. Well, saying they're not sharp is bashing them? DRAYMOND GREEN: Well, they boo me and they thought I had a tech that I didn't have, so that wasn't sharp. Q. It was on the box score. Everybody thought you had that tech. DRAYMOND GREEN: I knew I didn't, so maybe I'm just a little sharper than others. I don't know. But they play "Hit the Road Jack," and I didn't have to hit the road. So I didn't think that was that sharp. But maybe you thought that was sharp. Q. Well, I was looking at the box score. DRAYMOND GREEN: I was looking at reality. And I knew I wasn't ejected. Q. Did it take time to develop that filter? Or have you always had that filter? DRAYMOND GREEN: I'm just me. I've kind of always been this way. People tend to want you to change, but being me has gotten me here. Why change now? Q. Do you sense also that a lot of guys give you credit for kind of being the emotional heart of the team, too? DRAYMOND GREEN: I think that's my job. That's one of the reasons I'm here. I'm the emotional leader of this team. It's not like I put effort into that, like, oh, man, I need to do this and such and such. I just be me. Everybody go up in flames about it. Q. How do you expect your team to respond? Earlier you mentioned it was like a hit in the face? DRAYMOND GREEN: I expect us to come out guns blazing. You get punched in the face, you want to respond. We know what it takes to win a championship. We know what we have to do in order to win this game. I expect us to come out with a level of focus that we have had this entire series, minus Game 4. I don't think we came out with the focus level and intensity level that it takes to close out. I expect that tomorrow. Q. LeBron said something about how he heard that you were saying how you want to celebrate on their home court again. Something about how that gave them motivation. I don't remember you saying something like that. Was that an accurate remark? DRAYMOND GREEN: They asked me how would it feel to celebrate on their floor. That would be special, is what I said. But if you need to find motivation in something like that, then great. I don't really care. Q. Can Cleveland match that effort they had the other night, especially from three? DRAYMOND GREEN: I think they can match the effort they gave. But I think if we raise our level of effort and intensity, they don't hit 24 threes. I definitely expect to match that effort, but I expect ours to be a lot better. Q. Is there any pressure to not let things build? If they win another game -- DRAYMOND GREEN: No, there's no pressure to not let -- I mean, you want to win and close the series out. There's no added pressure in doing that. That's just what it is. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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