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NBA FINALS: WARRIORS VS. RAPTORSMay 30, 2019Marc GasolToronto, Ontario - Postgame 1 Toronto - 118, Golden State - 109 Q. I think people who don't know Pascal Siakam's game might have been a little bit surprised to see him score 32 points in his first ever NBA Finals appearance. What was it about who he is and what he's got that allowed him to perform on this stage that well? MARC GASOL: He does a great job of attacking those gaps, using his body, attacking the angles that the defense is giving you. He can go both ways. I just like when he plays that aggressive. Q. But given his improbable background and his lack of experience in this game -- MARC GASOL: That's not important. You play the game of basketball, you know. Whatever happened in the past happened. I think having a mindset of going for it and knowing that it's going to be okay, your teammates have your back, your teammates believe in you, that's all that matters and he knows that. Q. You've always been one to look for an extra pass but in this game you're a little bit more comfortable with going for that three and a lot of the other guys as well. Was there something that opened up for you guys, maybe extra passes that opened things up in terms of good looks? It seemed as though that worked for you guys on offense. MARC GASOL: They were blitzing Kawhi on the pick-and-roll and allowing the middle of the floor open or they were switching early on the offense. We did a good job of moving that ball and finding -- I still think we can do a better job on it, but it was good enough and I still think that we can do a much better job defensively than we did tonight on stretches. I felt the second half we improved our rebounding and we didn't allow I think as many second-chance points as we did in the first half, so overall happy. Q. Steve Kerr labeled them as dare shots opportunities you had where they didn't rotate to you and you had basically uncontested shots. Do they feel like you're being dared to make those kind of shots? And how does making those versus not making those early in a game affect your game as it goes on? MARC GASOL: If you're open, you got to shoot them. Dare, no dare, like you are open, you shoot them. And then we go from there. If they go in, great. If not you keep taking them with confidence. Q. You've played a lot of big games in your career but you never been on this stage. Were there moments tonight where you were able even for a blink able to reflect and be like, I'm in the NBA Finals? And what was that like personally for you to be able to be on this stage? MARC GASOL: No, my brain doesn't function that way. You're out there you're playing basketball like you did your whole life and it's the most fun. You lock in, not allow when they make a couple shots, tough shots or mistakes that you make defensively, kind of rattle you a little bit and frustrate you. You got to stay poised during the whole game. So your brain can't go anywhere else but every possession. Q. You said when you notice early that they are going to be very aggressive, trapping, sending a second defender at Kawhi, what, how does your brain function at that point, what signal gets sent to you? MARC GASOL: Well, if you watched the previous series against Portland they did that with Damian Lillard and C.J., so we assumed that there was a chance they were going to blitz Kawhi. So we were understanding the spacing that we were going to have and what kind of shot was going to be open, what kind of rotations they were going to do. Now, we got to still improve in some areas and spacing and moving out of that, but overall I thought we did a decent job. Q. Were you conscious of trying, when they did switch, trying to take a smaller guy down to the rim a little bit more than you have in previously in the playoffs? MARC GASOL: Yeah, and I thought that the guys did a good job of finding me in the post the two or three times that I went down there and it went well. MODERATOR: Thank you, Marc. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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