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NBA FINALS: CELTIC v LAKERS

June 8, 2010

Doc Rivers

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS: Game Three

Los Angeles Lakers 91
Boston Celtics 84

Q. At 84-80 after the second review by the refs, just inside of a minute, the shot you got was a Ray Allen three from the corner. What did you want there?
DOC RIVERS: Either a three or a two. We didn't need a three but it was open. If he didn't have a shot it was going to go right back down to the post to Kevin. We liked the motion, we liked the movement.
Listen, he was open. I don't mind that shot at all.

Q. From his eight threes the other night to going 0 for 13 tonight, have you ever seen that kind of swing in a player?
DOC RIVERS: No, it's a hell of a swing, I'll tell you that. You know, it's basketball. That's why you can't worry about it. He'll be back in the gym tomorrow and getting ready for the next game. I thought he was pressing early on some of them, and honestly, I thought all of his shots looked flat tonight. I didn't think he had any legs. I don't know if the knee and the thigh had anything to do with it, but I just thought he was short on most of his jump shots. Of the 13, I think eight of them were great looks, and all of them were short, all of them were flat. It happens to the best of us.

Q. The first replay review when you called the time-out, from your perspective what happened? And do you feel like if you hadn't called time-out that the replay would have happened?
DOC RIVERS: Well, they were going to replay it anyway. That's why I called the time-out. I thought that was a tough overrule because I watched it there five times, and I wasn't sure, and I thought that if it was inclusive that you couldn't overturn it. But clearly I was wrong.
Going by the percentages of the replays, we should replay a lot of them because every one of them were turned the other way. Maybe we need to use the replay more in a lot of our calls.

Q. When you're not hitting those threes from outside how does the change the spacing and everything else from the inside?
DOC RIVERS: I thought the first half they jumped on us. I thought we came out great. I thought Pau picked up the fouls and we subbed and we were flat off the bench, and they got a 17-point lead, which means that we were taking the ball out of bounds. It was a replay of Game 1 in some ways. The pace of the game was exactly the way they wanted. You can't run without misses, and they pounded us on the glass tonight. They shot a high percentage early in the first half, and it disrupted our tempo.
I thought we did a much better job in the second half in stretches, but you know, I thought some of the fouls hurt us tonight. You know, Paul, every game so far we've had one of our top players in foul trouble. Maybe I should start complaining about fouls. Maybe I can get a turnaround like it was turned around tonight. That was amazing.

Q. How much do you think that Coach Jackson's comments before the last game did have an effect?
DOC RIVERS: I don't know. I'll just let you -- I don't know.

Q. Talk about KG's performance tonight coming home getting a little home cooking.
DOC RIVERS: KG was great. Didn't get it enough. We talked about 20 shots before the game. He shot 16, should have had 25 as far as I was concerned. I thought there were a lot of times we still should have gotten the ball to him. I didn't think we had a lot of great ball movement tonight. I thought, again, it was a half-court game because of the way they were playing.
But you know, one of the things I told our team, Game 2, Ray had it. We did a great job of getting it to Ray. Game 3, Kevin had it. I didn't think we did as good of a job getting it to Kevin.

Q. You've had a lot of performances like this from guys on your own team. What about Derek Fisher tonight?
DOC RIVERS: Won the game for them. Derek Fisher was the difference in the game. You know, I thought we lost our composure a little bit down the stretch. A four-point game, 47 seconds left, I'm not sure exact time. All you need is a stop. We let Derek Fisher dribble the ball all the way up the court, unattended, get a three-point play. If you get a stop there, we had two timeouts left, three timeouts at the time, we had plenty of time. But that's where we got the mental toughness part for us. We've got to hang in there. It's not going to be an easy game, none of them are going to be, and that's what we have to do.

Q. Is this sort of a true indicator of how you see him as a player?
DOC RIVERS: Yeah, he's just a gutty, gritty player and he gutted the game out for them. I thought Kobe was struggling a little bit and Fisher, he basically took the game over. I don't know what he had in the fourth quarter, I want to say 13, 14 in the second half, but most of them were down the stretch.

Q. Can you just talk about the defense of Ron Artest on Paul Pierce. And also Paul seemed to reach in a few times for those fouls.
DOC RIVERS: Yeah, he did, and I don't know if it was Artest's defense or the foul calls on Paul. You know, Paul never got a rhythm. Every time he came on the floor, another whistle blows and he had to sit down. He was completely taken out of the game by the foul calls. I'll give Artest credit when he deserves it, but today it was more that Paul Pierce had to sit on the bench. He'd play five minutes, have to go back down, four minutes, have to sit. I mean, he wasn't allowed to play. They didn't allow him to play tonight.

Q. Was it something that Perk was doing that limited his minutes or did you just like Baby --
DOC RIVERS: No. Baby was playing well. No conspiracy. Baby was playing well.

Q. You were talking about before the game feeling fortunate to win the last game because two of your big three were not making shots, and again tonight two of your big three weren't making shots.
DOC RIVERS: Yeah. Paul had good looks in the first half. I think he was 1 for 8 or 1 for 7, and then I thought in the third quarter he was getting it going and then bam, there's the whistle and he has to sit again. You felt bad for him. That was their best play.

Q. How do you feel about your team's defense on Kobe in the series so far? And is there any frustration that he's not shooting the ball especially well and you guys are still down 2-1?
DOC RIVERS: Well, we're down 2-1 because we're not shooting the ball particularly well, either. Kobe does so many other things, though. Tonight he struggled from the field, but he did make a lot of plays. I think people fail to realize the reason a lot of the other guys are open is because Kobe Bryant is on the floor. That's why it's so important even when Paul or Ray are not scoring, we need them on the floor, because it opens the floor for other people, and when you take them off the floor because of fouls, then it changes it.

Q. What do you do to go forward in Game 4? What adjustments do you make?
DOC RIVERS: We don't make many. Bench has to be ready to play, to start when they come in. I loved our start. I thought we played great. We were getting stops, we were running, we had a great tempo. We've got to continue to find the open guy and trust offensively. But the team that's won the glass so far in this series has won the game, and we have to do a better job on the glass.

Q. How big a loss is this for you at home?
DOC RIVERS: It's a big loss until the next game. No one thought this was going to be an easy series. We didn't. And so it's not. So we'll bounce back.

End of FastScripts

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