NBA FINALS: CELTICS VS. MAVERICKS

June 13, 2024

Tim Hardaway, Jr.

Dallas Mavericks

Practice Day

Q. Is your family here? I think I saw your father.

TIM HARDAWAY JR: My dad is here. It was great to have him here supporting. It's great.

Q. For you as an individual, how do you feel in these Finals, besides the results?

TIM HARDAWAY JR: It feels fine. You've got to be able to express your feelings. It's amazing just to be here, be a part of something that a lot of guys never really been able to play in.

Just embracing it and try and do the best we can.

Q. Can I ask you something about the defenses, they switch all the time in the perimeter. Is it more difficult playing against them than the other teams in the league?

TIM HARDAWAY JR: I think it's difficult playing against everybody in general. But specifically Boston, 1 through 5, they all can guard. Even when you're trying to find weaknesses in their defense, they always come back or they always have a back line of defense that helped that guy out.

They don't really do a great job of just playing individual defense. They do a great job playing team defense, which goes a long way and which everybody can see.

Q. You were so close yesterday, no threes, of course, but what will be the biggest adjustment for tomorrow?

TIM HARDAWAY JR: I think the biggest adjustment will be being able to build on that fourth quarter that we had yesterday. Played desperate, played well. Everybody was defending, keeping their man in front of them, contesting every shot, and rebounding, making sure they didn't get any offensive rebounds.

If we can build off on that moving forward, I think we give ourselves a great opportunity.

Q. I know he's the enemy right now, but having played with Al in Atlanta, is it kind of amazing for you to see the evolution in his game?

TIM HARDAWAY JR: I mean, Al has been the same way since we've been in Atlanta. Always solid. Always solid, never doing too much, never getting out of sync, keeping everybody together, an anchor on defense, talking on defense, which gives the guards amazing confidence to guard their man, knowing that he's in that back line.

Just him being able to make it this far and be in this position, very, very happy to see him.

Q. Is there a part of you that sees him picking up Kyrie and Luka on the perimeter and thinks, like really, you’re still doing this?

TIM HARDAWAY JR: It's part of their defense. Like I said, it's not an individual defense, it's a team defense, and they take pride in it. They're one of the best at it, if not the best at it. It's not really him on an island picking up Luka and Ky. He has a really solid back line behind him making sure he's confident out there in front of those guys. Yeah, that's probably the reason.