NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: HAWKS VS. BUCKS

June 24, 2021

Jrue Holiday

Milwaukee Bucks

Practice Day

Q. After you kind of look back at it, what did you see in terms of the way you guys started defensively and then when you switched, for lack of a better word, to some of the second-half stuff and the switches? What did or didn't work? What can you build on going into Game 2?

JRUE HOLIDAY: I think the switches worked. I thought it was a good game. Kind of came down to the last minute or so where it's possession by possession, and they made more possessions than we did.

Coming down to it, there's other things we need to do like rebound. One of the bigger parts, John Collins and Clint Capela on the boards did a great job. So yeah.

Q. You mentioned the rebounding before; how difficult can that be in the sense of if they're taking 28- to 30-footers and it's not just -- and it's long rebounds, it's not just as simple as boxing out a man or chesting up a man, you've got really strange angles. Does it truly come down to effort or can you try to plan for that?

JRUE HOLIDAY: No, it's a little bit of both. I think a little bit of it was effort. It's the effort to actually turn and box and if you have to face guard, if it's somebody like me who's smaller, have to face guard, push him all the way down and let somebody else get it. Effort for me, especially because I'm always by the three, to actually come in and get those long rebounds. So it's a little bit of effort. Sometimes it's just a little bit of luck. Sometimes the ball just doesn't go your way.

If you want to win, you've got to have them.

Q. What is like a perfect tag look like for you, getting Capela -- you're going to have to X out, right, and go grab him. What does that look like for you?

JRUE HOLIDAY: Just push him. Just try to push him as much as you can. I know one thing as a guard, bigs don't like to get hit below the waist, so just to be able to box out, get in the knees so that they don't move, they don't have leverage, and again, it's about boxing them out, it's not necessarily about me getting the rebound. If I'm there, I box him out, somebody else can come and get it.

Q. For you offensively, what did you like about the way you executed in the first half? Even if you didn't hit shots but just the way that you executed.

JRUE HOLIDAY: I thought we executed really well the whole game. I thought we had some great shots, some great looks, some wide-open ones that we didn't make, at opportune times and ones that came down the stretch that we usually make and didn't make.

Offensively I think we played well. We got a lot of wide-open shots and we'll start knocking those in.

Q. One thing the Hawks have gotten good at is hiding Trae. They find a way to keep him out of the action. Are there things that you can do to put him in it more often defensively?

JRUE HOLIDAY: Yeah. They just do a good job of hiding him.

Q. Kind of a pick-your-brain question here. I saw a number of times it looked like you were anticipating the screens that were being set for Trae Young, like you knew they were coming and he would almost refuse them. Why is it difficult to read off of him versus anticipating? Why would you do one versus the other?

JRUE HOLIDAY: I think I try to do a little bit of both, and sometimes when you anticipate you get crossed over and he does a little shimmy and then he shoots, which that's whatever to me. But sometimes it's about the screener, and the screener you either have to go over or go under. Sometimes the screener slips. So there's times where you actually have to anticipate if the screener is going to slip or if he's going to go over and under. Sometimes when you go under or when you go over, they move all the time. Moving screen is a real thing, they're just not going to call it.

So yeah, I feel like there's a lot more that goes into maybe just my thought process or my brain going over a screen. And then on top of that you can't really be physical with somebody like Trae because he does Trae things, like runs into you or he stops short or crafty things. A lot kind of goes into that. If we could be more physical and be into him, that's what we do. Just kind of have to go with what you're given.

Q. Do you ever think about forcing him into the screen? Like making sure he uses it?

JRUE HOLIDAY: Yeah.

Q. I know easier said than done, I'm just asking if that's an option.

JRUE HOLIDAY: Sure.

Q. Give me some context on the reaction there.

JRUE HOLIDAY: How do I say this? Sometimes our system isn't too sent in one way, like if you're going to shade somebody, shade him either to the right or to the left. It's where the screen comes from. Sometimes you hear it, sometimes you don't. It's loud. So sometimes I anticipate because I don't hear it. But I can also -- I've been fortunate enough to be able to like read when somebody is coming behind me.

But there are times where, yeah, you try to send him to a screen one way and the screen is actually not there. Again, that's part of communicating. Just a couple different variables that gets confusing.