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NBA WESTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: SUNS v MAVERICKS

May 24, 2006

Mike D'Antoni

DALLAS, TEXAS: Game One

COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Another normal night in the NBA. A heck of a game and both teams up and down and we really wanted to make the last shot. And that about sums it up. They played well and we shot the ball pretty good. You know 55%, but we can shoot it better. Played a lot of heart and desire, came up with the big plays at the end.
Q. What do we know about Raja right now?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: He strained something. We hope it's a strain it. Could be worse. Could be better. We'll see tomorrow with the swelling. And we'll do everything we can to rehab him and get him back, but we don't know.
Q. Coach, career high for Boris, can you talk about his game?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Which is unbelievable. I'm standing out there, someone said he had 34. I had no idea. Usually I have a sense. He's a little bit like Shawn Marion, I have no sense in what they're doing. And you know it's funny I felt so bad for him because the next to last play, when he kind of scribbed it up there. He comes back, my fault guys, my fault guys. Said it 15 times to everybody. My fault. Goes down and hits the big shot.
You know, one point there was a label on him that he was a soft noncompetitive player. That's who we got from Atlanta. And I'm telling you what he's just the opposite. That's why it's easy to put labels on people, and it's a lot of times not -- definitely not even close to the truth. He's one of the best competitive guys we have. Most competitive guys.
And just an intelligent basketball player that knows how to play and couldn't happen to a nicer guy, that's for sure.
Q. Coach, what did you do about your team? You know the Mavericks always make a run. What did you tell your team to prepare for the run?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Just hang in there. We turned it over a few times, and again, you're right, sometimes I get mad at the guys because we didn't hold 'em off.
But Mavericks are too good not to make a run. They're too good not to put us in some kind of position where we're going to have to make some big shots, big plays, and we came through. So I was just trying to hold it in there and, you know, some breaks go against us and some for us, and if you can weather those storms, we were just scoring enough points, at a clip that I thought we could win if we could just come up with a few stops or if they just didn't make a couple shots. It's pretty simple game sometimes.
Q. Coach, Shawn Marion, he seemed like he came up limping. Is he going to be okay?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Hope so. Hope so. Needs to be.
Q. Was Boris the primary option on that last play?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: No. Steve Nash, but they knew the play. They scoured us, I read one time about five months ago and they figured it out and they were yelling down there, Steve, you'll have to ask them but Steve said he saw them. When Boris got the ball he was to pass through a back door to Steve. Steve said go Boris and Boris took it and scored.
Q. How did Devin Harris spark them in that third?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: By driving the basket, his speed, his quickness. You know he's dangerous. He goes. And sometimes out of control, but he definitely brought them back and did a great job. It's not surprising he did a lot against San Antonio the same way. We'll try to figure out a little bit to slow him down, but he's a heck of a player.
Q. How did you feel, 62 points and you were kind of even on the rebounding but only a four-point lead?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: That we missed, we're 2 for 9 from threes. I thought we could hit some shots. We had a couple of lulls and the lay-up came out at the end we could have been up ten points easily and that would have been right.
Q. Did you think Boris took advantage of a lot of mismatches and went small and he was the one that ended up with the small guy?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: They I'm sure will have to try to figure out the pick-and-roll and we'll keep doing it until they figure it out or whatever. But you know Boris is really good. Whole second half, obviously, I didn't know that. But he was. And what the guy's done is incredible.
Q. Is this the pace you'd like the team to continue?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Yeah, we're doing that. We're throwing the ball all over the place. You guys better duck sometimes because it's coming. And if we make shots and have that energy we had tonight and make big shots we'll be okay.
Q. Coach, your team seems to have such great chemistry and everybody gels well together but it's a very diverse group. What if anything does this, your success say about the sort of international movement of the --
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: You know, we have a lot of mature guys on the team, and sometimes a different culture gives you that. They're away from home. They've had to do things, you know, they grow up without being really pampered. And I know Boris, to get where he's gotten has sit on the end of bench, yelled at and thrown towels at and get him to where he needs to be as a basketball player. I experienced that in Europe. He has and Leandro and they'll never ask why they'll go as hard as they can and play for the team. That's some special that they bring.
Q. This follows the Game 1 pattern where you won the game but maybe you don't feel like you played your ultimate best game?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: We always feel that way. We're coaches, we need to feel that way. I'm sure the players think, they're feeling pretty good. But our job's half done here. We wanted to come here get two. We think we can, and we're going to come back and, you know, lay some up in a couple days. So we'll be ready to go.
Thank you.

End of FastScripts...

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