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NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: CAVALIERS v PISTONSMay 22, 2007Mike BrownDETROIT, MICHIGAN: Practice Day Q. I know you've played one game of the playoffs, but could you kind of talk about the organization taking the next step and getting to the Eastern Conference Finals? COACH BROWN: You know, we truly believe we're obviously a playoff team, and that's something that we have no doubt in our minds where we should be at the end of the regular season. And our next goal once we get there, into the second season, is to go for that championship. You know, we're not satisfied with winning a first-round series, we're not satisfied with winning a second-round series. We truly believe that we're in the business to win it, and we're confident. Making it to the Eastern Conference Finals is a nice accomplishment, but it's definitely not something that any of us are satisfied with doing. Q. Could you kind of talk about some of the criticism that LeBron has gotten for oftentimes for deferring to his teammates? It just seems that that's kind of part of your game plan, just to kind of let him set the flow of the game initially and then see how things work out. Could you talk about that? COACH BROWN: For LeBron, he's in a tough situation. He has the weight of the world on his shoulders because of all the publicity he's gotten ever since he was in high school, so everybody expects greatness from him all the time. He's playing tremendous for us in the playoffs. He's in the top five, I think, in scoring in the playoffs, he's in the top five in assists, I think. He's up there in rebounding, he's up there in minutes, so his numbers are very good right now during this playoff run, just like they were in the regular season. But people expect his numbers to be even higher than what they are, which is understandable. I want LeBron to go out there and be himself, and if he feels like he can attack, go ahead and attack. If he draws a double- or triple-team, go ahead and make the pass because I know that he believes in his teammates and they believe in him, and that's how you form a team. You look at some of the other superstars out there, in my opinion, Tim Duncan is the same way. If Tim Duncan gets doubled or tripled, he's going to make the right pass. He's not going to force up any type of shot at all because he believes and he trusts in all his teammates from Tony Parker to Manu Ginobili to Brent Barry on down the line. It would be kind of funny because I think if there were times when LeBron was selfish and didn't make the pass, I think he'd get criticized the other way (laughing). So he's just got to keep playing his game and keep believing in himself and his teammates, and we'll get good results from there. Q. After watching the film, did he make the right play on that? Because it looked like he could have gone all the way to the rim. COACH BROWN: You know what, Donyell, like I said before, Donyell -- and I thought this during the game, Donyell could have literally had a cup of coffee and a sandwich. That's how wide open he was. Anytime you have a shooter like that that's wide open, if you make that pass, I don't blame or fault anybody. Could he have gone up and taken the shot? Yeah, he could have. He had Tayshaun on his hip, Rasheed had come up on the strong side and Rip Hamilton was coming over, so he had drawn three defenders, and with LeBron being LeBron, there is a chance that he could have made the shot because he's so talented, but he did give his teammate a clean, wide open look with plenty of time to set his feet and shoot the basketball. Q. LeBron was pretty certain after the game about that shot, he was saying, "Hey, I'd do it again, you have an open teammate, I'll take it." What did you see from him specifically on the plain back or when you talked to him about him either being certain about that or maybe then taking another look and thinking about it more? Did he say anything about it? Can you give us some specifics about what happened after you guys left the arena? COACH BROWN: Well, there was nothing. Usually we don't talk about the game right when we leave the arena because, A, I haven't really had a chance to watch the tape; and B, a lot of times guys, including myself, are still extremely emotional. A lot of times you can say or do the wrong thing if you do try to talk about certain things that quickly after a ballgame. So there was nothing said. I have not said anything to him about the shot. I obviously have not showed him the shot nor the team the shot, so there was nothing done about it. Q. Can you talk then about what you are going to say to him tomorrow? You mentioned a little bit in your news conference last night about telling him to be more aggressive. Are there more specifics you're going to tell him that way, to be more aggressive in the next game? COACH BROWN: Well, I'm not talking about the next play, I'm just talking about just in general. He's LeBron James, and I don't mind him at all any time he wants to break off a play and attack the rim. Rasheed had a tremendous game. He had seven blocks, but on top of that, he changed a whole bunch of our shots. We drove the ball, not just LeBron but quite a few of our guys drove the ball moving or avoiding Rasheed's -- trying to avoid Rasheed's length, and we can't afford to do that, because all the shots that he altered and made us miss doesn't show up in the stat column on his behalf. We've got to make sure when we attack the rim, we attack the bigs that are jumping because they're leaving their feet and they're coming towards us, so we've got to attack their bodies and put the onus on the referees to make a charge or a block call. But we can't go from side to side or try to move the basketball and shoot a reverse layup off-balance because Rasheed Wallace is coming. Again, I'm going to tell LeBron that plus everybody else on our team because we had a lot of guys doing it. Q. Two questions: It looked like if he had shot, it looked like LeBron would have had to use the off hand, left hand. COACH BROWN: Correct. Q. Also, he would have had a triple-double if Donyell makes the shot. Is that not Donyell's favorite shooting position? And did he not have a great game last game? I just don't understand why that was a bad play to some people. COACH BROWN: I don't, either. You know, like I said, LeBron, it's funny because he's one of those guys, again, that with all the publicity he's gotten, whenever he does something, it's in my opinion from -- around the media world out there and most places, everybody wants to be critical. Donyell had a tremendous game. That is Donyell's favorite spot to shoot the ball, that corner three, and I thought he made a heck of a pass. He made a heck of a play. I'll live with Donyell shooting a wide-open three any day. That's won us a lot of games. Q. One other consideration was that was going for the lead and not just to force overtime on the road. Was that part of the consideration at all do you think? COACH BROWN: No, you know, maybe in his mind, but our guys understand that if we get a clean look from three like that, I don't care if we're down two, down one, step in and shoot that three. We don't necessarily have to go for the tie in that situation. If we get a clean look, I want whoever has that clean look to step in and knock the shot down because you don't get good shots like that in the NBA often, let alone against the Detroit Pistons. Q. I think it's been five straight games you guys haven't scored 90 points. Two of those have been in the 70s. How concerned are you with your offense right now, and what can you do to get some more points on the board? COACH BROWN: You know, we, again -- I thought throughout the course of the ballgame because of the attention that LeBron draws, we had some decent looks from the field, and we've got to step in and we've got to knock them down. We've got to be more aggressive at attacking the rim to see if we can get to the free-throw line against this team, and then as much as possible we've got to get out and try to run in transition or push the ball in transition to try and get some easy looks, which is tough against this team because this team does a great job of getting back and stopping the break. You know, we knew coming into the series that it was going to be a tough go for us, let alone anybody, with the way that Detroit has been defending. You know, they held Chicago, who's a very good offensive team, to right around 88 points a game and 40 percent from the field. So we knew it was going to be tough, we just have to continue to try to execute and try to get stuff on the backside of our play sets and look to attack in the half court trying to get to the free-throw line and in transition. Q. If you guys hold Detroit to 79 points and still lose a close one, how does that bode for the psyche of the team? I'm not sure how often you can hold them to 79 on their home floor. COACH BROWN: Well, it's the same thing. Last year when we took them to seven games it was a low-scoring series. Offensively we didn't play well at all, but their defense had something to do with it. But the funny thing about it is we won three of those seven games, so offensively they couldn't have been playing well, neither, and our defense had to have been good. We understand it's going to be a defensive contest and we understand that it could be a low-scoring affair. We just have to know that we can't afford to make mistakes, especially down the stretch. We made a couple of defensive mistakes down the stretch and didn't cover for one another, where Chauncey was able to hit the two threes and they were able to get some decent looks because of it. So we've got to be almost perfect going down the stretch, especially on the road against this team. We understand that. It's not disheartening at all. It's a good team. We still believe that we can win, and we still have confidence that we can win. We just know that we've got to be even better than what we were last game. We've got to be better the next game out. Q. I just want to ask you about Detroit and Cleveland being in such close proximity. Is that situation preferable to you, that you're able to go home and kind of regroup in your own environment? Do you prefer it this way? COACH BROWN: Yes, I do. This is great. It's a short trip, and then if we need to between games, we can go home. I definitely prefer this than having to fly for two, three hours. Q. So did you have practice today and how did that go? COACH BROWN: We did not have practice today. Our guys have not had a day off in I don't know how long, so we needed to give them a break in order to rest their bodies and just regenerate their minds, and we'll get back together tomorrow. Q. When you were in Indiana, San Antonio, where did you find LeBron more dangerous, as a passer or as a scorer? COACH BROWN: As a scorer in transition. That was our biggest concern with him is when he got to rolling in transition and they got up and down the floor, he was hard to deal with then. Q. How much credit do the Pistons get for yesterday's game and his 5-for-15 performance? COACH BROWN: They get a lot of credit for it. They did a nice job defensively on him. Whenever he had the basketball, they made the paint look crowded, so you've got to give them credit for doing that job. But I do still feel like that he will be able to get loose a little bit more than what he did that game and have a more productive game for us when it comes to putting points on the board. Q. Because he didn't shoot that well, do you think that worked into his decision to pass that off at the end? COACH BROWN: You've got to ask him that. I'm not sure. Q. I think at this point in time hammering about the woulda, shoulda, coulda about the Game 1 is pointless with Game 2 on the horizon. As Game 2 rolls around, what do you need the Cavs to do to stop Detroit? COACH BROWN: We need to have the same defensive effort, same defensive intensity, especially as the game wears on. We can't afford any mental breakdowns, and we had a couple, like I said earlier, we had a couple down the stretch that cost us, especially on Chauncey's two big threes. So we've got to do a better job in that, in terms of closing the deal. And then offensively, like I said before, we've got to attack the rim. We can't avoid or look to avoid Rasheed's ability to come over and help and block shots. He's going to get his blocks. We just have to try to go right through his chest and see if the referees call a block or call a charge on us because he's a talented individual that not only affected the game offensively late, but he affected the game defensively the entire time he was on the floor. Q. Last night it seemed like you were a little frustrated that you guys weren't getting to the free-throw line? After watching the tape it sounds like maybe you think that your guys weren't properly attacking the basket. Did you feel that was more the issue? COACH BROWN: That was part of the issue. I did see that there were times that we did attack the rim the right way, and they should have called a foul, but they didn't. That's how it goes. I'm sure Detroit felt that they probably attacked the rim a couple times and they should have got a foul called. But it still baffles me how LeBron can play 45 minutes and get zero free-throw attempts because he did at times attack the rim the correct way. Having said all that, yes, I do know that our guys have to do a better job more consistently when attacking the rim, not to try to avoid Rasheed blocking the shot but to go right through his chest and put the onus on the referees to call charge or block. End of FastScripts |
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