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NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: HEAT v PACERSMay 25, 2014Paul GeorgeMIAMI, FLORIDA: Practice Day Q. This team's been down throughout the season. Do you take some sort of solace in the ability that you can come back here tomorrow night? PAUL GEORGE: Yeah, I think so. A lot of stuff that's putting us in the hole is stuff that we can prevent. So I think, if we just tighten up the areas we need to tighten up, we'll be all right. Q. Defense has to be another area you tighten up, specifically, Dwyane Wade. That floater really killed you all last night. PAUL GEORGE: Yeah, that was an adjustment they made. LeBron and D‑Wade both went to the floaters and tried to bring out Roy. We're well aware of the adjustments they made. It's just about improving in that area. But we've got to do a better job of on the ball, just doing a better job competing on the ball. Q. And staying out of foul trouble, I assume, for you? PAUL GEORGE: Yeah, I've got to try to be on the floor as much as possible. Q. I know, obviously, you were dealing with the foul trouble, but Stephen A. Smith was saying this morning that he felt like you still needed to take it to another level in terms of the elite production that you should be putting out there, just to kind of also counter what they're getting from LeBron and Dwyane. How do you feel about that? PAUL GEORGE: I'm going to play where the game goes. I'm going to play within the game. I'm not going to play outside of the game. I tried to be as aggressive with the time that I was on the floor.  I do feel like I can bring it to another level as far as being more aggressive, and I will in Game 4. But as far as that, I was trying to get guys going, trying to make the right passes, the right plays, but I will be aggressive as far as trying to put the ball in the hole myself. Q. What about even from an emotional level? Do you try to take it upon yourself? I mean, everyone says that David West is the leader of this team, but even from an emotional, you see how LeBron gets hyped and Wade when they score. Do you need to emit that a little bit more from your body language? PAUL GEORGE: Not really. Not really. I got to be a leader. I got to be a leader. I want to be a leader for this group going forward. So if that's what it takes to get my team going, then I'll do so. Q. Has the Heat made you more of a facilitator, double‑teaming you the way they are? PAUL GEORGE: Yeah, because whether it's a pin down, pick‑and‑roll, almost anything involving someone setting a screen for me, they're pretty much just trapping and double‑teaming. So it does make me have to get rid of the ball and try to find the man that's open. So the ways that I got to be aggressive is just trying to attack when there's one‑on‑one situations and I'm isolated. Q. How frustrating is it that this team has so much control, and just in the final moments you guys lose that control, and it winds up costing you the game? PAUL GEORGE: It is frustrating because we proved we can play well against this team, and we always do. It's the same story. We turn the ball over, and they get home run plays from it. That's the ball game. We dealt with that with Washington, Atlanta. That's really when we're at our weakest is in the transition. We're a half‑court defense team. In order for us to be able to do that, we've got to put the ball in the hole ourselves as well as doing a better job in transition. Q. Why do you think it is? What is it about playing this Heat team that you guys still have to learn getting over that hump closing out these games, especially when you have the lead? PAUL GEORGE: I think that's when they play their best. That last three minutes of every quarter seems like they really play like their back is against the wall for that period. I think it gives them momentum, gives them momentum going into the next quarter. That's where we've got to get better because it seems like that's where we're losing games. We come out, we're the aggressors to start games off. Almost in every quarter, we come out with an assertiveness, and then the close of the quarter is always where the roles are kind of reversed. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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