NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: PISTONS v HEAT

May 25, 2005

Dwyane Wade

DWYANE WADE: First of all, I just wanted to be more aggressive than I was the first night on driving the ball to the hole, not looking for fouls, just looking to finish. As I did that, then the rest of the game opened up for me, so that was my main thing coming into tonight.

DWYANE WADE: Well, I didn't read anything y'all said. I didn't read anything that the Pistons said. I just listened to the people I listened to all year, all my coaches, my high school coach, college coach, my NBA coach and then I looked at film. I know I'm human and I'll have some bad games, but it's all how you come back the next game. I helped my team get a win tonight, and that's all I can ask for.

DWYANE WADE: You know, I had so much influence and Coach Riley telling me that -- even the great ones, even Jordan had a bad game. "Don't put it all on your shoulders. Come back and play hard." I think one of the biggest things that helped me was Zo and Shaq yesterday when I was at home, they came and picked me up and we went for a little ride, and we were just talking, you know. We all got one goal in mind. We all want to win a championship, and us three have got to be big parts of that. I'm just going to play my game and be a leader on this team. I listen to guys who have been doing it for years, and I just try to come out and make them proud.

DWYANE WADE: Oh, just driving around my neighborhood, just driving. Shaq came and picked us both up, and we had a good drive, a good time. That's what this team is all about. Any time someone is struggling, someone is down, there's always guys that will pick you up. That's why we've got something special here with the Heat.

DWYANE WADE: It comes from God. God has given me the ability to be in this position, to be a key component on one of the best teams in the league, playing in the NBA. I have all the confidence in the world in myself, and if I have a bad game, I try to come out the next game and do something different and be aggressive. I believe in my ability and my teammates believe in me, my coaches believe in me, so I have no worries that way.

DWYANE WADE: They just wanted me to miss one. They said "Let's make it a game if you miss one." My teammates care about me. I got a call late last night and I thought Shaq was crazy when he called me because I looked at the time. I think it said 3:45, 2:45, something. He just wanted to reiterate to me what we talked about on our ride. He told me to come here relaxed, calm. He couldn't sleep so he wanted to wake me up, I guess. Like I said, this goes to my teammates really caring about me. They never want to see me down, so they tried to pick me up.

DWYANE WADE: I think both games I have done that it's been a close game. Just getting the opportunity to get open looks and once you get one or two or three, then you get in a groove. You start feeling good and you want to continue it. Coach gave me the ball every time to make the play happen. It was a close game back and forth, and I was just playing it. I wasn't trying to do nothing that I haven't done all year. I was just playing and hit some shots and got my team over the hump.

DWYANE WADE: It's going to be a great battle. All these games are going to be battles. You've got two teams with great will. You've got a team that feels like they've been underdogs all year, the world champion, so it's going to be a battle. They're going to come out and make adjustments, and we're going to make adjustments. They did their job. They came up here and got one in our house. It's a long playoff. We've got to go up there and take care of business.

DWYANE WADE: Yeah, like I said, when he called me I thought he was crazy at first. He just called me and went over the things we went over earlier when me and Zo was together, and that was to come out and be the player I've been all year, don't worry about any criticism that I heard or that anybody said about me and just come out and play. He said it was going to be a dogfight from the beginning to the end, and I'm the leader of the team so go out and lead the team. Like I said, any time he calls me and gives me confidence to go out there and take over, I don't want to let him down. I go out there and try to do it.