NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: CELTICS VS. HEAT

September 25, 2020

Jimmy Butler

Miami Heat

Game 5: Postgame

Boston Celtics 121, Miami Heat 108

Q. What changed in the third quarter? What did you do differently? What did they do differently?

JIMMY BUTLER: They started attacking. We stopped guarding. Never, never a good thing for us. I think all year long, we've said that for us, it needs to start on the defensive end. I think we did that okay in the first two quarters. Then after that, it was all downhill.

Q. A lot of times a team takes measure of itself when it faces adversity in moments like this. Obviously in the third quarter when adversity came, the team had some issues. How do you see it going into Sunday and how do you see this team's resolve standing?

JIMMY BUTLER: We'll be back. You know, we've got to go over some things. We weren't on the same page a lot of the times and I just think we've just got to talk whenever we're out there on the floor. That's what it all comes down to. We'll be ready to go on Sunday. Come back better and get ready to get a win.

Q. What do you think it says about someone like Bam, who said the loss was his fault.

JIMMY BUTLER: It's not. It's on everybody. He does so much for us that it can feel like that at times but it's definitely not on him. It's on us as a whole. We all understand that because nobody was playing the way that we are supposed to play; the way that we have to play in order for us to win, nobody. And for him to say that, I respect it. I love him for it. But he can't do it by himself. We've got to be there with him.

Q. Following up on that and Bam, at the end of the game the other night, he hurts his arm. Tonight he struggles a little bit. He tries to take the blame. Do you, as somebody who respects him the way that you do, feel like you need to say something to him to give him a little pick-me-up between now and Game 6?

JIMMY BUTLER: I will. I will. But I think he knows, he can't get stuck on this game now. We learn from it. It's something that will pass. We need him to be who he is on Sunday. We're going to need everybody to be that way. We're going to watch some film. We're going to learn from it. Not going to say we don't already know what went wrong, but we will be ready to go. We will fix it.

Q. We saw Udonis on TV in one of the timeouts in the fourth quarter being very animated with you guys. Without telling us exactly what he said, what were some of the things he was pointing out to you guys that was hopefully helpful a little bit?

JIMMY BUTLER: That we were just getting outplayed. They were playing harder than we were, which we all knew. We've just got to correct that. That's where it starts for us. Any time anybody is playing harder than we are, we are not playing our best basketball. I think a lot of it for us comes from how hard we play, how together we play, and we've got to get back to doing that.

At the end of the day, when you sum it all up, that's what he was saying.

Q. How do you explain the first six minutes of the second half? And how important is it to keep the pace of the first half in Game 6?

JIMMY BUTLER: We just -- I guess let up off the gas. We weren't communicating. We weren't as aggressive on either end of the floor, and they were way too comfortable. I'm sure that they said they were going to do whatever changes that they said they were going to do and came out and did it, and we didn't play our best basketball on either ends of the floor. We know that. We get that. We will be ready to go on Sunday.

As far as the first half goes, we were just okay in the first half. We weren't great there, either. So you know, full 48 minutes is what we've got to try to put together.