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NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: CAVALIERS v PISTONSMay 26, 2007Zydrunas IlgauskasCLEVELAND, OHIO: Practice Day Q. (Inaudible). ZYDRUNAS ILGAUSKAS: I think the biggest thing is we're a great home team. We had a great regular season here at home. We're confident that we can get it done, but it won't be easy. Just because we're at home we can't think we don't have to show up. If we do that, we can easily be down three before we know it. Q. (Inaudible). ZYDRUNAS ILGAUSKAS: I think he's learning as he goes on. He's going through this process for the first time, the Conference Finals. This is our first time as a team. Some of the guys have been here before but with a different team. None of us played this late into the season with this team, so I think we're all learning as we go. We like where we are. We know that we're down 0-2 but we had a shot to win each of those games. Hopefully we can take care of business here at home. Q. (Inaudible). ZYDRUNAS ILGAUSKAS: I think just maybe relax a little bit and just play his game. It doesn't matter. He's such a threat whether he's scoring or not because of the attention that he draws. I think we as a team have not done a good job of capitalizing how much attention he gets to himself. We could do a better job getting better shots and stuff like that. So hopefully we'll do a better job on Sunday. Q. Have you noticed the growth that he has shown as a leader? Is that tangible? ZYDRUNAS ILGAUSKAS: Yeah, this whole year. He's 22, you know, and I remember myself at that age (laughing). I have a lot of respect for him because I've seen him come from a high school kid four years ago and grow into this and everything he had to go through, all the pressure, media. So I'm proud of him for what he is. Q. It's Rasheed's contention that Andy flops. When you watch him, how do you respond to that? ZYDRUNAS ILGAUSKAS: Andy is hard to play against. You know, he's a tough kid and he keeps on coming. Sometimes he looks like he just got shot (laughter). But he's tough to play against. I played against him for four years in practice and there were some days I wanted to kill him because I was so frustrated. So I know what the opposing team goes through because he goes a lot harder in the game than in practice. But you know, he's a very big part of this team, what he does. In the last three years that we've had him here we won a lot of games like that, where he ends up playing over there, a lot of games for us in here. I would hate to play against him, but I love having him on my team. Q. Does he flop in practice? ZYDRUNAS ILGAUSKAS: If you ask him, he'll say no. But we ask him not to do it because (Inaudible). Like I said, he goes 100 miles an hour and there's no stopping. That's why he's so valuable for us. Q. People see that this is a physical series, but what's it like actually being out there? Are you left with bruises, welts? What's happening to you that's physical? ZYDRUNAS ILGAUSKAS: Well, I think at this point everybody is a little beat up body-wise, but these guys are, like I said, physical, but I like it because nobody likes to be calling fouls and stopping every 30 seconds, especially in the fourth quarter. But you do feel a little bit more beat up after these kind of games. That's to be expected. Q. Did you ever have any games in Europe that were in the 70s? ZYDRUNAS ILGAUSKAS: (Laughing) Sometimes. We didn't play 48 minutes, we played 40, so the scoring wasn't as big. Q. Is this to you kind of an interesting phenomenon, like every point is so important? ZYDRUNAS ILGAUSKAS: That's kind of what it's been like if you look at our history with Detroit. We always have been in the 80s and 70s even during the regular season because I think both teams are good defensive teams, both teams run a half-court offense, and by now we know how each other play so it's hard to score. End of FastScripts |
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