NBA FINALS: PISTONS v SPURS

June 15, 2005

Rasheed Wallace

RASHEED WALLACE: I was definitely excited when I first got here to be teamed up with him. It's fun but yet it's hard to be his teammate for the simple fact that he was Defensive Player of the Year three out of last four years, so, you know, everyone knows that he has his side of the block covered, so I've got to try to do what I can do to cover my side of the block. But as a person and teammate, Ben, he's a good person. You know, he has definite family morals, respect, values and he's just an all-around cool person.

RASHEED WALLACE: Yeah, definitely, because at times like, this especially -- this is our second time here, for some guys on the team it's their first time, so just try to keep them loose and not all tense where if a guy throws a pass away or misses a shot, it's not the end of the world. Just got to go back down to the other end and play defense.

RASHEED WALLACE: Well, we're still down 2-1, so we're not sitting up here jumping for joy. We still have to go out there and try to accomplish what we did last night, tomorrow, and that's our bottom line. That's our main focus.

RASHEED WALLACE: Well, I think for the next game it will probably be said. We know we have to come hard. We know we have to bring some energy that we brought last night to match their effort.

RASHEED WALLACE: McDyess is a good player. Dyess and I go back to high school, watching each other, little Christmas tournaments and things like that. But, you know, watching him as he was drafted with me and the teams that he's been on, he's been a great athlete beginning of his career, ran into a couple knee problems, but that didn't stop him. That didn't break him down. He went in rehabilitation, got his knee back together and here he is today. You know, he had that determination that, okay, he had a couple serious, career-ending injuries, but he would not let that stop him to get where he wanted to go.

RASHEED WALLACE: I know he has to be feeling real good with himself. You know, it wasn't planned or whatever for him to be here. Like I said, he had that determination to get through his injuries. I know he's real happy to be here, but I know he's not satisfied with being here.

RASHEED WALLACE: I think to be more involved. You know, he's a major part of their offense, don't matter if he's not even scoring the ball, every time they bring that down the court on the offensive set, he's touching that ball. I think they will probably look to get him some more touches.

RASHEED WALLACE: No, I'm not trying to be a great scorer of the game. Great scorers was Kareem, Mike, Larry Bird, they were great scorers, but I'm not out to be a scorer in this game. Personally, it doesn't matter to me if I had the worst career stats in NBA history as long as I got my ships. The ships, it shuts everything up.

RASHEED WALLACE: Definitely. We did have a couple of guys that were not drafted, McDyess with injuries. Guys came on different paths, and it wasn't easy to get here. I think, definitely, that is one of the things that strengthens us as a team and going out there and having each other's back.