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NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: HEAT v BULLSMay 22, 2011LeBron JamesDwyane WadeMIAMI, FLORIDA: Game Three Chicago Bulls 85 Q. LeBron, you seemed really comfortable in the quarterback role the first two or three quarters, passing, waiting for guys to get open and give them the ball. Describe what you were seeing out there. LeBRON JAMES: I was seeing two defenders all night. Two or three defenders. I came into the game knowing that they were going to try to load up on myself and D-Wade. So I just changed my game plan tonight, be more of a facilitator. If I needed to get it going offensively, I could. The great thing about it CB had it going. When we have someone going on our team, we continue to give the ball to him and continue to feed off their energy offensively. And he brought it home for us tonight. Q. Dwyane, you got the call from Chris in July saying, I'm thinking Miami, and everything sort of fell into place from there. After all he's been through and all things said about him this year coming into this series, that the Heat only have two great players, he wasn't one of them, how happy are you for him that he's able to have moments like this? DWYANE WADE: Well, obviously very happy for him. A lot of people don't understand how difficult it's been to make the adjustment, to play with two other players who dominate the ball so much. Some games he gets it, some games he doesn't. So to find a flow, to find a rhythm, sometimes it's tough. Chris is a professional. He stuck with it. And he's been able to really explode, have big games. They talked a lot about it in the Boston series, he did what we wanted him to do in the series. He did a great job defensively and rebounding the ball and then he started scoring some. This series he's really playing big for us. We know that to win the series Chris is probably going to be the guy who probably will lead us in scoring from that standpoint, because his attack to the basket. So he's playing great. Q. When you see that Derrick Rose only attempts two field goals in the fourth quarter and seems to at times have trouble attacking the paint, do you feel what you guys are doing defensively in terms of scheme and execution is working at this stage? LeBRON JAMES: I think defensively what we've done all year has worked. We have a system, and we make adjustments at times. But we stick to our guns. We know defensively when we're active and guys are on the string and if one guy gets beat, another guy is there to help him, we're very good. So Derrick Rose is a great player. He's going to find creases. He's going to get his shots. That's what great players do. We try to make it tough for him. Try to make it tough for not only him but his teammates, also, make them take tough contested shots. It's a long series still. Through three games we found a way to just play our defense and not dictate our defense on what they do. We just play our game. Q. How big was Udonis for you guys tonight? DWYANE WADE: He was big. Obviously we were excited he got to come back in this series. We know he worked so hard. He really wanted to come back in the Boston series, but we wanted him to continue to work, continue to work. Now we got the lineup we envisioned having a lot with Chris and UD to finish the games up for us. Both guys who can spread the floor, make shots and also play in the paint. And his toughness. You see the charge he took on Boozer was huge for us as well. Like I keep saying, he's the heartbeat of our team. We're both happy to have him back. Our team is that much better just with two games with UD being back. Q. Point guard play tonight, huge contributions after Bibby was struggling with his three-point shot heading into this game and Chalmers struggled in Game 2, and then he played the entire fourth quarter. Can you talk about the point guard play tonight. LeBRON JAMES: They were great tonight. Bibby knocking down two huge threes for us in the third. And I think 'Rio (Chalmers) coming in and having his hand. He also got a strip, a big steal for us. He was solid. Derrick Rose is a great player. Our point guards just try to stay in front of him as much as possible, trying to contain him. They're doing a great job so far. Our point guards are very key to our team. When they play big and make shots and also defend like they are doing, we're a pretty good team. Q. Dwyane, Chris admitted tonight that what Boozer said is something he was thinking about every time he shoots, that there's only two great players on the Heat. Did he bring it up with you guys at all? DWYANE WADE: He hasn't brought it up to us. When something is said public about you that way, any great player is going to respond in a way. I was glad he said that about Chris. He came here with a different focus every day from practice, shoot-around to the games. Chris had that same focus. We saw it this morning in shoot-around. Everything he did tonight he was doing today. We're glad he got that challenge. He's responded to it. So we'll see hopefully at the end of the series maybe they'll say something different about him. But right now we understand what he means to us. That's all that matters. Q. You're 7-0 at home in the playoffs. The only team undefeated at home. How big is Tuesday? LeBRON JAMES: I mean, I think they're looking at it how we looked at it after Game 1, saying if we can walk out of here with a split, then we feel comfortable going home. That's what they're thinking. Coming into our home building, we have to continue to give our fans what they want. That's wins. We come in with the same mindset as we had Game 2 and Game 3. Defending, executing offensively, we give ourselves a good chance. It's a very good rebounding team. We've done a great job of just trying to lower those offensive rebounds and second-chance points each game from Game 1 to Game 2 to tonight. And if we do that, we give ourselves a good chance. We're looking forward to it. Q. Dwyane, take me back to the first quarter there and the defensive mentality as you were able to hold Chicago to 25% in that opening quarter. DWYANE WADE: Well, I mean, like I said, we understand what's going to win this series for us is going to be on the defensive end. So we just -- like I said, we did a great job of helping each other out. When one guy got broke down, our bigs is there for each other. We try to do our best to rebound the ball. We held them to 15 points at the end of the first quarter. That's a good quarter. That's a damn good quarter for us defensively. And offensively we understand it's going to be opportunities we're going to get times we're going to go on a run. But defensively it's all about effort, it's all about toughness and heart at this point. Everyone that came in the game did their job. Q. Chris has talked sometimes in the past about being a little different than some of the guys he meets around the NBA. He has his head buried in a book a lot, things like that. What have you learned about his personality as you spent this season with him? DWYANE WADE: I mean, he is different. He's Chris Bosh. That's the reason we all wanted to play together. We understand that he's a guy who -- he internalizes a lot of things. He keeps lot of things inside. When he speaks, he's very educated, very smart. He thinks things out. He never answers before he talks. Before games, a lot of guys listen to music. A lot of guys do their own thing. Chris, his head is in a book. That calms him, that gets him ready for the game. We can buy some more books for him. He can read all day. He's Chris Bosh. He's different, yes. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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