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NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: PISTONS v CELTICS

May 20, 2008

Doc Rivers

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS: Game One

Q. How's Paul Pierce doing, giving so much in that last game? And then second of all, things come out about Tim Donaghy saying players and coaches may have relationships with referees that impact games. What are your thoughts on that?
COACH DOC RIVERS: I'm not going to talk about Tim Donaghy on the eve of an Eastern Conference game, if you know what I mean. That's over with and in the past as far as we're concerned, and our league is concerned, hopefully.
As far as Paul, that's just Paul. We're good, we're ready to go. We're where we want to be, we're where we thought we would be, and we're ready.

Q. Talk about Chauncey if you can a little bit. And weren't you in Orlando when he kind of waved from a distance and they made that trade there and stuff?
COACH DOC RIVERS: I can't hear you.

Q. When Chauncey, when they kind of semi-traded him with Orlando and he kind of waved from a distance?
COACH DOC RIVERS: Yeah, I had him, I think, for three months. He never played in a game because he was injured, but that's when I became very fond of him. He knew when he was traded to us that he was injured, that he wasn't going to play, and he would probably go sign somewhere else. Yet he didn't miss a practice, he didn't miss a meeting. He actually spoke up at times. That team that went 41-41, it was an amazing group of guys. And from that day forward, I had the utmost respect for him because I don't think a lot of guys would have done that.
He came and worked out every day and did his shoulder rehab along with everyone else. You know, I've told him that many times. I thought that not only meant a lot to me obviously, but it was really important to our team.

Q. How did he slip through so many cracks?
COACH DOC RIVERS: Well, you know, at that point, no one knew what he was. Hell, I never even got to look at him. But the coaches before that didn't know if he was a point or a two, and I think what they found out is he was just a heck of a basketball player and he's a heck of a point guard.

Q. Over the season you guys had three really entertaining match-ups. Did you hold anything back strategy-wise heading into the playoffs?
COACH DOC RIVERS: No, I'm not smart enough. You guys tell me that every day (laughter).
I'm joking, but -- half (laughter). No, you don't hold anything back. I mean, hell, obviously we were hoping that we would be here, but no, you play the game and you show your cards and they show their cards and that's it.

Q. Can you talk about Tony Allen? Obviously in a series with Detroit he was used in defensive situations. Could we maybe see more of him?
COACH DOC RIVERS: Yeah, you could see him and you could not. We'll see. It really is going to determine how the series is played. We pretty much just are trying to say with what we have and what we've used.
Having said that, this team has been great all year with being able to grab a guy that hasn't played and go in and perform. We work on that every day in practice, we work on that in shoot-arounds. We talk to guys like Tony and Baby and all the guys, "stay ready, stay ready," and they've done an incredible job of that. Heck, Eddie did that. It was terrific what Eddie did. We were playing Sam, and Sam was struggling defensively in our minds. Offensively we didn't really care. And he came and responded, you know. We have that type of team.
If Tony is needed, he'll be ready, and we have full confidence in that.

Q. The lottery is tonight. A year ago at this time you guys were hoping to win it. Can you talk about how devastated you were that you didn't win it last year and how things turned out?
COACH DOC RIVERS: Shoot, I was the luckiest guy on earth.

Q. Exactly, and how lucky it was that you didn't win it?
COACH DOC RIVERS: Yeah, if we had gotten one or two I would have probably been interviewing somebody today before the game for ABC or TNT or something. Expectations would have been unrealistic with one of those two young guys, and they would have pegged us to win everything. And as a coach and a staff we all know that we would have been a little better with talent but we'd have been younger, and it would have been one long year. So the best break was that night.
Now, at the time I obviously didn't see it that way, but later, once you thought about it -- I came to that realization a lot sooner than people thought.

Q. Just the difference that Rasheed, and the match-up problems that he causes. He's so unique.
COACH DOC RIVERS: He is a unique player. He's a freak in ways because he has a great post game and power game, yet he's such a great finesse player. You know, they're good because of that. I mean, they're good because of their individual talents. But when you have a five who can pop on a pick-and-roll and stand behind the three-point line and take a five out there with you, and then can throw it down to McDyess, you know, it stretches your defense, and that's what Rasheed does.
He's one of the few fives that trails in transition for threes. Every five and four in their life have been taught to run to the paint defensively in transition, run back to the paint. Yesterday and today we're telling him, stop at the three-point line. It's funny, you're just not trained to do that.
I have fans that ask me, how does Rasheed get left open every night? Don't they know? I said, "Yeah, they know, but they've been trained to do something their whole lives." It's very difficult. It's something our bigs are going to have to do every time down the floor is find Rasheed, and it's very difficult to do.

Q. All year people have been talking about Rondo as a weakness in this match-up against Billups. Have you seen growth in Rondo both ends of the court that he can apply maybe to this match-up with Chauncey?
COACH DOC RIVERS: Well, the only growth that we would love to have is 6'5" and 225, but he's had mental growth and he's grown tougher.
Now, Rondo has heard all year, not just the Billups match-up, he's heard all year what he can't do and what we can't do with him, and yet we're here because of Rondo.
I got testy with someone that kept talking about this match-up. Well, someone is going to have to guard Rondo, too. He has a quickness advantage in this series and he's going to have to use that.
Clearly Chauncey is a match-up nightmare. I told Rondo this, he's a nightmare for everybody, not just this team. Every time Chauncey puts on a uniform, he probably has an advantage over the guy he's guarding in size and strength, but you have to use yours, and that's what we plan to do.

End of FastScripts

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