NBA FINALS: HEAT VS. NUGGETS

June 3, 2023

Kentavious Caldwell-Pope

Denver Nuggets

Practice Day

Q. You were mic'd up in the last game. Every single time down the court, you're talking about defense, defense, get set on defense. Do you do that every game?

KENTAVIOUS CALDWELL-POPE: Yeah. I try to, as much as possible. Just to keep my teammates engaged on that end because we can sometimes get lost, and then we're scrambled a lot. Just trying to keep them focused on the game plan that we've got defensively.

Q. That game plan changes, obviously; is it like a captain or somebody who distributes the game plan? Is that you?

KENTAVIOUS CALDWELL-POPE: It does change a lot, but whatever Coach is drawing up or we're talking about in the huddle, I try to keep telling the guys on the court what we're doing and where to be. Even myself, just to remind myself I'm supposed to be in these positions.

Anybody can come out and say it, but it seems like I'm the main person just doing it.

Q. They missed a lot of threes. How much of that was your defense, and how much of that was just missing threes?

KENTAVIOUS CALDWELL-POPE: They had a lot of wide-open threes. They generated I think 16 open threes, so they had wide-open threes, and they just missed them. But we had almost like 50 something contests on all shots. I want to credit our defense for making them miss, and just got to continue to do it Game 2.

Q. What advice do you give your teammates?

KENTAVIOUS CALDWELL-POPE: Stay motivated. We're here; don't fumble the ball on the 1-yard line I would say. We've got three games left, let's stay focused and let's get this championship.

Q. After watching the film, what are some areas you still want to clean up even though you did win Game 1?

KENTAVIOUS CALDWELL-POPE: That fourth quarter. We came out a little flat. We had great looks at the basket. We just didn't knock them down. But we wanted to get into our offense a little bit earlier than 14 seconds on the clock and just play normal basketball, our basketball, go through our game plans and our plays and just try to get a great shot every time.

Q. Were you happy with the pace of that last game, or are you looking to get out and run a little bit more?

KENTAVIOUS CALDWELL-POPE: We could be better. We were happy we got the win, of course, but our pace and how we played throughout the whole game, we can be a lot better.

Q. Your take, playing with LeBron, playing with Joker, what's similar, what's different?

KENTAVIOUS CALDWELL-POPE: No difference. I've got that question so many times. They're both high-IQ basketball players. They make their teammates better, and they can score on any level. I don't see no difference.

Q. When you ended up here, because you didn't play with him, you knew about him, how much did Jokic exceed your expectations?

KENTAVIOUS CALDWELL-POPE: Oh, man, he still does to this day. Every game it's something different, or in practice he's showing something that's like real magical. But he never ceases to impress me, just playing with him. He's made me a better player, makes his teammates better around him. He just likes to see everybody happy.

Q. What does he do off the court to make teammates better?

KENTAVIOUS CALDWELL-POPE: I don't see him much off the court, but just being active in our group chat, just talking, joking around a lot. He's really a comedian.

Q. What changed for you in the past four to five years? You didn't have the best time at the Lakers but now you're here. What do you think changed with you physically, mentally?

KENTAVIOUS CALDWELL-POPE: Just been taking care of my body, staying in the gym, being ready for any opportunity that I get, and just basically just staying ready.