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NBA WESTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: SPURS v LAKERSMay 25, 2008Gregg PopovichSAN ANTONIO, TEXAS: Game Three Q. Your thoughts on Manu's performance and how effective he was from the field tonight? COACH POPOVICH: Well, he played great. Manu, you know, he made shots, took with what the game offered and did a really fine job obviously. Q. When Manu plays that well, how much pressure does that take off what Tony does? COACH POPOVICH: Well, when those three guys score the way they did tonight, it really helps us because that's usually our problem. Our losses are we have scoring droughts, so when all three are clicking that way, it helps everybody. Q. Pop, did you have any hint at anything like that was coming from Manu? Did he say the ankle felt better? Was there anything he got different treatment-wise? Anything? COACH POPOVICH: No. Didn't even talk to him about his ankle. Didn't ask him anything. Q. Just talk about the contribution from Brent Barry tonight, how huge that was for you guys? COACH POPOVICH: I thought Brett was really valuable. He really makes the offense tick. Good passer, reads the situations very well. And I thought he played a fine game for us. Q. When did you make the determination to give him an earlier look and more run? COACH POPOVICH: In the last day or so. I mean, you know, ... Q. How do you feel he did on Kobe even though he had 30 points? It seems like you put him on an island sometimes, he couldn't really move the ball around a lot. COACH POPOVICH: Well, as most of us always say, you can't stop Kobe, but you want him to work hard for what he gets. I think he had to work hard tonight. He's very dangerous. Scores in so many different ways. Everybody feeds off of him so much that you have to at least make him work hard. And I think Bruce did do that. But he is going to score. Nobody is going to stop him from scoring. Q. You talked earlier at that today about ball movement and how good was that for you tonight? COACH POPOVICH: It was better. It wasn't great all the time. But we did move the basketball more. Didn't just come down and post it to Timmy so much. He had his opportunities to, you know, be a passer, be a scorer. It is important to do that after there's some flow, not just right off the bat when you bring it up. Q. We have all seen players come back off of a bad game and struggle and all. But the dimensions of what Manu did from Games 1 and 2 to this, does he ever surprise you? COACH POPOVICH: You know, he really doesn't. He is such a competitor. He puts so much on his shoulders, he fights through a lot of things. He understands what he's done in games all his life, both in Europe and over here. He's got a lot of confidence in what he can do. And so when has these games, it is really not a surprise anymore. Q. Pop, earlier tonight you were talking -- you weren't comfortable about -- what you said about home-court victories. Did you see anything in the last 48 minutes that might have enlightened the view on the home-court victories is this? COACH POPOVICH: I was just asked it seems during all the playoffs the teams are winning so much more at home than away. I don't have any better answer. It just seems to be happening. For right now, I hope it continues but only in the short-term. (Smiling). End of FastScripts |
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