	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

NBA FINALS: MAGIC v LAKERS

June 7, 2009

Stan Van Gundy

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Game Two

Orlando Magic - 96
Los Angeles Lakers - 101

Q. You went the last nine and a half minutes without either Jameer or Rafer on the floor. What prompted that decision? And how effective do you think it was?
STAN VAN GUNDY: You can decide how effective it was. You know, I thought Rafer was playing well, but they're just leaving him open on every post-up, and we couldn't get the ball in the basket, so we were just searching for somebody to be able to make a shot. Obviously we didn't find anybody. Our guards were 6 for 26, and I think for the most part -- I thought, again, LA's defense was good, but I thought our guards for the most part had very good open looks. For the most part we just couldn't knock anything down. That was the only thing, we were just trying to see if we could get somebody out there who would make shots off of the double teams and off the pick-and-rolls and things like that. I thought our guys fought hard, but we couldn't make enough plays.
And the 20 turnovers crushed us in the end.

Q. Can you talk about that last play of regulation of Courtney?
STAN VAN GUNDY: He missed it. I don't know what else to say. Hedo made a -- we executed well, Hedo made a great pass, and we missed it. I don't really know. I'm not trying to be a pain in the butt. I just don't know what else to say about it. It was a great pass, it was right there, and he missed it.

Q. And you mentioned the guards just not being able to get shots and the offense in general.
STAN VAN GUNDY: I thought they got plenty of shots. I don't think it's much trouble to get our guards shots; they're not guarding them. They're only guarding three guys, so it's not very hard to get those guys shots.

Q. So the execution then, how do you fix that?
STAN VAN GUNDY: I don't have any idea how to fix that.

Q. Where did that play come from? Have you seen something that made you think that he was open?
STAN VAN GUNDY: If I did, I would have called it the first time. We had to take a time-out after the first play. That didn't work, and you draw up something different.

Q. Did you just draw that up or did that come from deep in the play book?
STAN VAN GUNDY: Well, I mean, I have that play, but I did draw it up. I mean, so I don't know how to put that. We've run that play before, but it's not one our guys would know on a call. We certainly haven't run it much. We've run it maybe two or three times.

Q. Can you talk about the decision to put Hedo on Kobe Bryant and how that went?
STAN VAN GUNDY: Well, I didn't think that we had a lot of choice. When Pietrus fouled out, I think that -- you know, if you notice the first part of each half, particularly the first part of the second half, on Courtney, on smaller guys, even when we were trying to come and give some help and double, he was just turning away from the double, raising up, and so we felt like we needed more size on him.
We couldn't get much playing time out of Pietrus today because of the foul trouble, so when he fouled out, I mean, I don't have a lot of choices. I don't have another big guard. All our other guards are small, so it's Hedo or Rashard.
How did it go? About like it always goes guarding Kobe.

Q. In two games you lose the first game by 25, you lose a nail-biter in overtime here. You've done as a coach everything you possibly could have done today --
STAN VAN GUNDY: I wouldn't say that. That's not right. We win and lose together. It's not me doing everything and our players not getting it done. All we did was try a lot of stuff today. If you don't walk out with a win, you didn't do the right stuff. The bottom line is we tried some different things.
I will say this: I'm not sure I got another lineup to throw out there that you haven't seen now, okay, unless I'm going to play like Dwight, Marcin, Tony, Rashard and Hedo. I don't have another one now. We played with no point guard, we played conventionally, we had Rashard at the three, we played Hedo at the one, two and three. We played Rashard at the three and four. We played big, we played with no point guard. What do they say, just keep throwing stuff at the wall and hope something sticks.

Q. What do you tell your team as you go home for three games?
STAN VAN GUNDY: I mean, what I just told them was the bottom line is we knew we were going to have to win here in LA in this series, just like we had to in the Boston and Cleveland series. From a mental standpoint it was a little easier in those series because we won Game 1. Bottom line is we came here for two games and we didn't get the job done. Now we have to go home and have a great Game 3. I've seen series turn, as I told them. I was still in Miami not doing a damn thing, but I was still in Miami in 2006 when they lost both games in Dallas and then were way down in the third quarter in Game 3 at home, came back and won that one, Dallas never won another game.
You know, series can change. You've got to take it one game at a time. Right now extremely frustrating not to have gotten tonight because I thought we fought hard. I didn't think we played great again because we had 20 turnovers but we fought hard. We had chances to win. We didn't get it done. We've got to go home and play a great game in Game 3 and get the win.

Q. I'm not talking about a moral victory because there are none at this stage, but do you think that at this point you're starting to see there's some ways you can attack the Lakers? Do you feel like there's a formula you're putting together as a coach?
STAN VAN GUNDY: No, I didn't see that. If the formula was 20 turnovers and 41 percent shooting, it's not a very good formula.

Q. As far as Hedo and Rashard tonight, they had a much better offensive night than the time before. What do you draw from that?
STAN VAN GUNDY: Well, Rashard made shots, so that's a good thing, and I do think -- Rashard I thought was very active away from the ball moving around. I thought he moved without the ball. We moved him into some different spots. He moved on his own on Dwight's post-ups and on pick-and-rolls. They lost track of him a little because they're giving so much attention to Dwight on the roll, and Hedo on the pick-and-roll was able to get free a little bit. I thought Hedo made some good plays on the pick-and-roll but also had five turnovers, and I thought for a while there, particularly late third quarter, we did a good job on Dwight's post-ups. Dwight was patient, throwing the ball out and creating open shots, and then in the fourth quarter I think he wanted to do it. He wanted to do it and be the guy and forced him into some bad plays and some turnovers and some really difficult shots. So we went away from that.
But I do think all three of those guys played better than they did on Thursday night, and we'll need them to not only continue that but to get better from here.

Q. And also, as far as overtime, what do you think were the keys for the Lakers and what went wrong for you guys?
STAN VAN GUNDY: Well, I thought that where it turned, and we had back-to-back plays, I thought, where J.J. had a wide-open three, wide open and missed it, and then he had a play on a pick-and-roll and a turnover on the pass to Dwight. So we came up empty on two plays where I think we had created what could have been very good shots, and that was difficult. I thought J.J. played real well, but he was like the rest of our guards, he struggled to get it in the basket. I thought he played real well, but I thought those back-to-back plays sort of turned it their way.

Q. You were talking about needing to find something that worked in the half court. What you were just alluding to, the plays where Dwight was kicking the ball out to shooters, seemed like it got Turkoglu going. It seemed like you got a handle on how to run an offense?
STAN VAN GUNDY: That's kind. We had 20 turnovers and shot the ball 42 percent. We got it going a little better in the third quarter. I think the key for us, not because it's the Lakers or anything they're doing, simply because it's the way we play, we've got to continue to play inside out. And I thought when we did, when we got in the paint either on drives or on post-ups, took the second defender and threw the ball out, we were able to create pretty good shots. We've got to make more of them than we did, but I think we will.
But then there were still times when we forced plays, and obviously we've got to be a lot better with the ball. 20 turnovers, especially when you're not shooting it great, makes it very difficult. When I look at these numbers, it's amazing to me that this was an overtime game. I can't quite figure out how it was looking at these numbers.

End of FastScripts

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297