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NBA FINALS: MAVERICKS v HEATJune 9, 2011LeBron JamesDwyane WadeDALLAS, TEXAS: Game Five Miami Heat 103 Q. LeBron, you called this game the biggest of your career. Are you struggling at all with the pressure of The Finals, the pressure of the fourth quarter? LeBRON JAMES: No, I don't think so. I don't believe so. I know I'm not. We as a team, we played good enough to win again. Put ourself in position to win down the stretch. Everyone, guys made plays. They just made a few more than we did. That's what it came down to. Q. Do they need more offense from you in the fourth quarter? LeBRON JAMES: I don't think it was a case of offense again tonight. There was enough offensive play. We shot 52%, they shot 56%. We scored 103 points, they scored 112. The offense wasn't a problem. Q. You guys suffocated Derrick Rose and Jet in the fourth quarter of Game 1. Last two games Jet fourth quarter outscored you 16-2. Is he wearing you guys down? Is he just getting different looks? Why has Jet been able to explode in these last two fourth quarters? LeBRON JAMES: He made big shots. He made some great three-point shots tonight. A hand contested in his face. Some of them was open. He's just aggressive. We always said when he plays well, they're very tough to beat. That's what he's done the last two games. Q. Dwyane, can you take us through your injury and the challenge you had getting back on the floor both times. DWYANE WADE: You know, I'm not going to do that. I don't talk about injuries. It was unfortunate I had to leave the game. But I came back and I finished it. Q. Was it really hard to play through that? DWYANE WADE: No, once you're on the court, you're on the court. I don't have no excuses. I was on the court. I was able to help my team get an opportunity to win. And I'll be fine Sunday. Q. Erik came in here and said the thing you guys need to do the most over the next day and a half is work through the idea of closing out games. What did you learn in that stretch in March about closing out games that you can apply now? LeBRON JAMES: Well, it starts defensively. We've had a few breakdowns late in games in this series that we didn't have in the first three series. So it's something we know we can do. We just got to push through it. At this point we have no choice, honestly. We got two games left, and we worked hard all year to get home-court advantage. So we have to take advantage of it. Q. Dwyane, how much pride do you guys take in closing out games? And what does it mean to you not to have been able to do it in these few? DWYANE WADE: It's unfortunate. Obviously we put ourselves in a position on the road especially to win games. We haven't been able to do that. That's been our staple. That's the reason we're here. The good thing about life and the good thing about this game, we get another opportunity, another crack at it. We know it's the thing that's going to either lose or win us a championship. It comes down to either not closing out games or closing it out. We have another game Sunday to be able to do that. Q. LeBron, what was the adjustment process like for you guys once Dwyane was out? Obviously coming out and starting the third quarter without him is not anything you guys are accustomed to doing. LeBRON JAMES: Just try to work our same offense. I was able to get into the lane a couple of times, hit out for threes, hit out for guys that got some lay-ups, and also I was able to get to the rim a couple of times, put a little pressure on the defense. But it's nothing that you really can change. It's our habits we've been working through all season. With him being out, we just try to do the same thing as if he was in, but knowing that one of our scorers is down. But guys had to come in and try to make plays and pick up the slack while he was out. Q. Dwyane, that's something you've dealt with before. Is there a confidence level you'll be able to bounce back with treatment and everything like that for Game 6? DWYANE WADE: Yeah, no problem at all. I'll be good for Game 6. Like I said, I feel our team did a great job while I was out. We have a team that's deep enough that can make things happen. Mike Miller did a great job and enabled me to get more treatment in the back, so I could come back and finish out the game. Q. Dwyane, did you have any doubt you would be able to return? Spo said he had some doubt when you weren't out there to start the second half. DWYANE WADE: No, everybody know me -- at that point just trying to come out. The doctor not ruling me out, I can come out and help my team with my presence on the floor. I'm smart enough to play the game without obviously being 100%. That's all I did when I came back. I want to help us get back in this ballgame, and I was able to be effective in a sense. Q. LeBron, you said many times that your stats are irrelevant to you. Is that true at all with a triple-double, or does that rule still apply? LeBRON JAMES: Absolutely. The only thing that applies to me is a win. A win or a loss. I could have made a couple more plays for my team. But at the end of the day, all it's about is a win or a loss. Triple-double means absolutely nothing in a loss. So we will be better in Game 6 on Sunday. Q. LeBron, in the two games you guys have won, Jason Terry didn't score a single point in the fourth quarter. In the games that they won, he scores eight or nine. Going forward, how much do you take on yourself to really shut him down in the fourth quarter? LeBRON JAMES: Like I said, it's never a one-on-one matchup. I said that when he was struggling in the first couple of games, the games that we won. I said it's never a one-on-one matchup. JT is the reason why, like I said, in the top vote-getters of Sixth Man of the Year every year. He does a great job of staying active, staying in rhythm and they get him the ball in the fourth quarter. So I take pride in it. Like I said, I'm not going to always stop him or hold him under his average. I would hope so. He gets enough looks, he gets enough cracks at it, he's going to make a few in. We have to make sure we stay locked in and not allow him to get open ones like he had tonight. Q. LeBron, in the second quarter there seemed to be a concerted effort to get the ball to you in the post. They seemed to get away from that in the second half. Why did you get away from it and did you think about going down low in the stretch particularly with three minutes left when things were tight? LeBRON JAMES: Honestly, we just worked our game. I was able to get the ball in the post a few times in the first half. It worked. Some of them didn't work. Second half with D-Wade being out to start the second half, I took it upon to be a little more of a ball-handler, get guys into our offense. But we just try to take what the defense gives us. We have nothing to say about our offense tonight. We shot 53% from the floor. These guys shot 57. Shot almost 70% from the three-point line. Offensively had nothing to do with why we lost this game. We just couldn't get enough stops down the stretch. Q. LeBron, at 102-100 you had the ball at the top and you took a three there. Did you think about maybe trying to drive by him, or was he giving you so much space that was the best play? LeBRON JAMES: I didn't think about it. D-Wade gave it to me, I had enough room and I shot it. Shots I made before. I just didn't make it that time. Q. D-Wade, you went through this in '06. You know how funny momentum can be. Now that they have this momentum, even though they're going to your home floor, how difficult is it going to be to stop them now that they have everyone operating on all cylinders? DWYANE WADE: Well, I mean, obviously they're a tough team to guard. Like we said, they're the best offensive team in this game. But I guess they have momentum in the sense they came home and won two games. But each game is its own. We're going to come out -- every game has been pretty much a possession here, a possession there. Either team can come in and say they can be up different than what they are. We'll be coming to the game understanding it's a possession game in Game 6. Doing whatever it takes to win the ballgame. So we're confident. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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