NBA WESTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: SPURS v SUNS

June 1, 2005

Gregg Popovich

COACH POPOVICH: Very focused, he's always focused so it kind of -- but he gets super focused. He's harder on himself than anybody could ever be on him. I didn't even talk to him about free throws or anything like that after the game. He doesn't need it. He's grown. He's mature, he's incisive, and he will take care of his own business on his own. Very focused, I guess is what I have to say.

COACH POPOVICH: Not really true. A couple of people have said that, and with the cross matches Bruce could end up on virtually anybody. In one of the situations like on the last situation where Joe hit that shot, we purposely had Bruce on him at that point. It wasn't that he was on him for 7 minutes in a row or anything like that. On that one play he was definitely on him. But in general, it wasn't his assignment. His assignment, like the start of the game was mostly Marion and we stuck with that.

COACH POPOVICH: Well, I don't remember anybody ever scoring 40 a game, so guess he'd be number one. If you go by stats. He's been absolutely stupendous and unstoppable for us.

COACH POPOVICH: Well, sure. He's not just like a post-up guy. He runs the floor as well as anyone, two or three in the league. He gets a lot of points in transition because of that. He goes to the free-throw line because of that. He can attack. He's good in the post. His second jump is quicker than anybody's, except maybe Shawn Marion, so he's down there and he puts it up on the rim and he goes and gets it better than Shaq does because he's so quick. He's really developed his shot. We thought he was the most improved player since last year, but when you are already that good you don't get that award. It doesn't work like that. His shot is tremendous compared to what it was when it came into the league -- when he came into the league. He has got the whole package.

COACH POPOVICH: Well, that's a scary generalization in the sense that everybody is different guarding people, depends on who they are. Amare, he's not a five man. He's a very quick, very powerful, very explosive four man who plays anywhere he wants. Most centers aren't like that. They don't move like him. They don't run the floor like him and they are not as explosive, so he's different. He's not like guarding the five guy.

COACH POPOVICH: Well, he never -- he never blames. He never looks elsewhere past himself. He's not impressed with the NBA, all the hoopla around the NBA. He likes the basketball. He likes the competition. You will never see him involved in very much that has to do with hoopla. There's no MTV in him. That's the best I can say. What you see is what you get. There's no act, no show, no hype, there's no nothing.

COACH POPOVICH: No, no, we look at each other. That's about it. That's about it. Honestly, we don't say anything about it. If he had gotten 40, we wouldn't have talked. If he would have made every free throw, like what was it, 15-15 the night before or whenever? I didn't say that was a hell of a job with the free-throw line, Timmy, good work. I ignored it.

COACH POPOVICH: I told you, I am along for the ride (laughter).

COACH POPOVICH: I am thrilled for him. He's real excited. He's a young guy who has been around the league longer than people realize. He's been in Denver, in Washington, obviously San Antonio and Indiana, but really highly intelligent young guy; very energetic, very secure in his beliefs about what wins and loses; very defensively oriented. He will have a good base that he will put in the system. Really responds well with players. Our players loved him. They hated it when he left because they were going to be stuck with me a little bit more and they'd have to hear me. He presented things to the team all the time, you know, met with guys individually, showed them film. They really respond well to him so he has a great communicative ability. I think he has got a good breadth of experience where he's going to do a fine job in Cleveland, really happy for him.

COACH POPOVICH: Yes, because we don't send that many people to the board. You won't see our ones, twos and threes going to the board very often and we have always done that. We have never been a great offensive rebounding team. On that particular night, we got more than we usually get. But that wasn't why they got the ridiculous number of transition points. We were very poor in that area but it didn't have anything to do with four and five going to the offensive board really.

COACH POPOVICH: I am not trying to be flip or a wise guy or anything like that. We don't care. I mean, he doesn't have to do anything. Everybody wants him to do this or that. He doesn't have to do anything, but play the game and be who he is. As a team, we are what we are. We spend no time worrying about what we should or should not do for the media or the public or the NBA or anything like that. We hope we're doing things right. We hope we're not screwing it up but we don't spend any time being something that we're not.

COACH POPOVICH: No, not at all. We look for talent like everybody else and once you think you have the right amount of talent, or if given two choices and one person seems to be, you know -- they are equally talented but one person seems to be more team-oriented or I always like to say gotten over themselves, we would rather have that person. Not interested in the junk but just wants to play and go home.

COACH POPOVICH: Or lack thereof possibly --

Q. Is the deal that they got you so spread out that it's really hard to bring help anyplace?

COACH POPOVICH: I guess. I mean, they have scored -- in our regular season games we played them three times and I know two of them were high-scoring games. I think one them was a little bit lower scoring at our place but two of them were ridiculous. They do. They spread everybody out. I mean, shooters all the way around and they have got Amare doing what he does, so you are definitely spread out. There are a lot more possessions in a game against Phoenix so the scores are going to be higher, but your defense can still be good, but it does begin with transition, and you know, we gave up 38 points in transition Game 4. That's not going to get it against Phoenix.