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NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: PISTONS v CELTICS

May 28, 2008

Doc Rivers

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS: Game Five

Q. Just want to talk about the rebounding tonight. That seemed to be the biggest factor in this game tonight.
COACH DOC RIVERS: Yeah, we talked about it before the game. They destroyed us last game. McDyess had seven offensive rebounds on his own. Coming into this series, that was the number two things that we felt we had to do to win this series. Number one was pressure, ball pressure.
So we talked about it, and Perk went out and did it, and I thought that freed everyone else. He was sensational tonight, played with great energy. That's three games in a row that Kendrick Perkins has been absolutely phenomenal. No one saw it the last game because we lost it, but he was fantastic in that game, as well, with his energy. It was just good. The rebounding was huge for us tonight.
Offensively I thought we were good, as well, shooting 51 percent. You know, you should win games, and we did. We made it interesting (laughter).

Q. Did you know that Ray had one of these in him, or did you basically just know this was going to happen at some point?
COACH DOC RIVERS: I knew he had one in him. He's a great player. He hasn't stopped being. He just hadn't played well in a while. It didn't bother me. It didn't stop me from running things for him still. My belief was he needed two or three in a row instead of one. Everyone kept saying he needs one. I thought he needed two or three to get him going. He got it going, we came out of time-outs and got him some other shots. Kevin got tired in the third and we had to take him out, and getting Ray going was huge for us, and it was huge for Ray.

Q. Can you just talk about your decision to stick mostly with the starters. And were you thinking that your team got tired in the fourth and maybe that's why they lost part of the lead?
COACH DOC RIVERS: No, I don't think we got tired (laughing). We just had some bad turnovers. We've got to get the ball in Rondo's hand and the point guard's hand, him making decisions. His hook passes were not some of my favorites, as well. I made the decision before the game to shorten the bigs' rotation as far as Perk, PJ and Kevin. I just thought it was tighter that way.
I wanted either Perk or Kevin to always be on Rasheed for the most part. Unfortunately he didn't go to the post, he ran out to the three and made some shots, so that was his adjustments obviously.
You know, in the second half I told Rondo at halftime that he was not coming out, but don't play and worry about fouls, just play his game. And then with Paul, Pose -- I wanted a tighter rotation tonight.

Q. Just talk about the position you're in now, one away and two games to do it.
COACH DOC RIVERS: Well, we hope we don't think like that, with two games to do it. We've just got to think about the next game. We've got to have a great focus and a great intensity there. You know, they've won titles, they've been in this position before. We just have to go in there and play our game. That's the whole key. Whatever happens, happens. But we've got to make sure we play our game. We can't get caught up in anything that they're doing. I thought that was important tonight. We talked about it a lot yesterday and a lot today. They were grabbing and bumping and holding last game and it affected us, and tonight they were grabbing and bumping and holding and it didn't affect us. We kept playing. We played through it. We caught the ball when we should have caught the ball. I thought the only point where it did affect us was down the stretch when we were not aggressive anymore and we were trying to hold onto the lead again, and that's the second time we've done that instead of running through the game.

Q. Can you talk about the importance of shutting down McDyess tonight.
COACH DOC RIVERS: The one thing we wanted to do was attack him on the other end. He's been fresh. He's been fresh to rebound, he's made shots, and so we wanted to really attack him on the other end and make him defend a little bit, which we felt hopefully can get him in foul trouble or at least get him tired.
The second thing was to make him make shots off the dribble, no catch and shoot. We talked about it, no catch-and-shoot jump shots. If he puts it on the floor and makes a shot and you fly by, they're going to be mad at me because they don't want him to score. But I told them I'd live with that, I just didn't want him catch-and-shoot shots.

Q. Flip reiterated what you've said, just having Ray on the floor means he has to be covered. But he also said the one thing he noticed was he wasn't tentative today. He's been tentative for most of the series. Obviously you've been telling him to shoot, but what did you see different today.
COACH DOC RIVERS: Nothing really. I didn't know. You just don't know going into games. You just know he's a good player, and you keep believing that, and you know eventually -- I kept saying, I've been saying it throughout eventually, something was going to break for him. When he made the two shots in a row, I thought he's good tonight, so we just kept trying to get the ball in his hands.
This has been a tough stretch for Ray, and I give him a ton of credit. Number one, I thought this was his best defensive night, and to me that's more important. Number two, he never changed his routine, he never did anything different. He kept working on his game, he kept believing every day, and that's probably why he's been so great through his career, because he believes. Hell, if that had been me, I'd have been a basket case as a player. Most players would have been. But that's the difference between the good ones and the great ones.

Q. Rasheed Wallace just talked in the locker room that with the fouls it's not basketball, it's entertainment. Did you want to be physical enough with them to kind of get under their skin? Talk about putting pressure on them.
COACH DOC RIVERS: We were fouling a lot? No, we wanted to be physical, but we were just playing just like them. I'm glad I'm not an official because it's very physical out there, and they had Flip yelling at them. I never yell (laughter).
But we're both yelling, it's just a physical game. It's very tough to call. But it's both teams. I don't think it's any one team playing any more physical than the other. I thought both teams wanted the game badly tonight, and you could see it in both teams' play.

End of FastScripts

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