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NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: RAPTORS VS. BUCKS

May 19, 2019

Pascal Siakam

Toronto, Ontario - Postgame 3, Canada

Raptors - 118, Bucks - 112 (2OT).

Q. When you missed those two free throws at the end of regulation, what was going through your mind? But also, how do you then balance the desire to almost want to do too much to make up for that after and just stay within yourself and keep playing your game?
PASCAL SIAKAM: It's tough. Those are shots that you practice and you think about every day. At that moment, you're kind of mad at yourself. My teammates did a good job of just calming me down. Marc, Norm, everyone, Danny. Just talking to me and making sure that I stay in the game and I understand that I've got to stay in the moment and next-play mentality.

Then after that, we're in this together. At the end of the day, I've got to do everything to make sure our team comes out with a win. For me, that was just my mindset out there after that.

It was tough at the moment. Kind of mad at myself and down a little bit, but my teammates helped me out, just talking to me, and then just kind of snapped out of it.

Q. Pascal, were you happy to pass up the Giannis duties to Kawhi tonight?
PASCAL SIAKAM: I think we just want to kind of give him different looks. A player as talented as he is, you've just got to continue to do whatever you can do to kind of slow him down. Everyone was guarding him, just making sure that we keep different matchups on him and somebody always fresh on him.

Q. Heading into the game, there was a lot of talk about potential changes, whether it be changes to the starting lineup or the rotation or otherwise. Then Kyle fouls out in this game as well. What does it say about your depth to close out this kind of game?
PASCAL SIAKAM: Man, it means a lot. Shout to Norm, just coming in and just bringing us energy and just giving everything. Marc, the same. Fred, Serge -- those guys came in and just fought the whole game. That's what we did all season. We've been a team all season. We always had that mentality. Just being at this moment, the highest stage, and having those guys step up. Sticking together at the end there when we could have gotten down on ourselves, but we didn't. We fought through, and we're just glad that we were able to get a victory.

Q. Was there anything specific that any of your teammates said to you after those free throws that stuck out?
PASCAL SIAKAM: I think at that time, everyone is talking to you, but it's kind of hard to listen. You're just in the moment. I just remember them talking to me. I tried to get out of it. But at the end of the game, Kawhi said that he played an hour of basketball. I told him, My bad.

Q. I'm wondering when you go up that high to block a shot, one, do you get nervous about how hard it's going to hurt when you get down there, and have you had a chance to look at the replay and sort of see what you did there?
PASCAL SIAKAM: When you miss two free throws to kind of ice the game, you don't think about how hard you're going to fall. I didn't think about it. I just saw the play and I just went for it. I was kind of hesitant a little bit, but I just had to get there and make sure that he doesn't score.

Q. This team has been through a fair bit even in just this playoff run, but when you look at the way you guys got this win, what you had to do to grind it out, Kyle fouls out, Norm fouls out, Freddy hits a shot, Danny hits a shot, some of the plays you made. What does it say about this team as a group that you were somehow able to win this game?
PASCAL SIAKAM: Man, it says everything. It says everything. Even when we have bad games and we don't play as well as we want to, I think one thing that you can always count on is for us to come back and as a team to play stronger and give everything that we've got. I think that's just the mentality that we have as a group. We've got to continue to fight every single night and just go out there and let it out on the floor, and at the end of the day we're going to live with the results because we know how much work we put in. We know how bad we want it, and it just continues to show every single night. We just want to take this. It was a hard victory but we're going to take it, and then the next game try to get another one.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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