NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: PISTONS v HEAT

May 29, 2005

Richard Hamilton

RICHARD HAMILTON: We definitely did. I think we're too good of a team to have a meltdown like we had tonight. We've been in this situation too many times to let anything bother us, and I think this late in the season, Eastern Conference Finals, we can't afford to have any letdowns. I think the last five, six minutes of the game we didn't play the way we were supposed to play. We let little ticky-tack stuff bother us.

RICHARD HAMILTON: We've got to take care of business at home. We let an opportunity slip away tonight. We had a great third quarter and the beginning of the fourth, and we kind of let one slip. We've just got to come out and play the way we played that third quarter. We can't let anything bother us, just go out and win.

RICHARD HAMILTON: Like I said, when he sat, we were up five. We had all the opportunities in the world to win the game. We missed a lot of free throws. Like I said, we had a meltdown. We were getting technical foul after technical foul, shooting three pointers where we should have driven and things like that. It was all just understanding the game. Usually we don't make that type of mistakes and tonight it really cost us.

RICHARD HAMILTON: He came in and gave us big-time minutes, trying to keep Shaq out of the paint. Lindsey did a really great job of trying to contain Dwyane and trying to get steals on him. We need them guys. I think our bench is key. Hopefully they continue to play that way in the series.

RICHARD HAMILTON: I told Arnie Kander, (strength and conditioning coach), these last two days was really great for me. I'm actually getting my step back, getting my explosion back and things like that. This is the best that I've felt since the first quarter of the Indiana game. So it's a good thing, and I just feel I've got to keep doing treatment and stuff like that that he wants me to do, but I'm starting to get my explosion back.

RICHARD HAMILTON: It's lack of concentration. There's no way that we'd miss 15 free throws. Like I said, we had opportunities to go up six, opportunities to go up seven, and we just let it slip away. Like I said, we're too good of a team to let them little minor mistakes cause us a loss in free throws, arguing at the refs, taking our time on the offensive end and things like that. There are things we usually do all the time and we just didn't do it tonight.

RICHARD HAMILTON: He got into foul trouble. I think that Shaq is a problem to anybody. I think when Ben got into foul trouble, we had to try to keep something and get guys in there to take fouls and things like that. But we're going to need Ben. He's the heart and soul of our team, and I definitely believe that he's going to bounce back for the next game.