On tough shooting night: "I don't know if it wipes out any chance (of winning) but it makes it that much more difficult there is no doubt about that. I think Andy (Varejao) was kind of on fumes a little bit tonight. He didn't look like his old self. He might just be getting a little tired. We don't have much time to be saddened by it because we have another one tomorrow night."
On offensive difficulties with injured players and Varejao struggling: “We’re still there. We’re not the only team that’s going through with having some guys that are hurt, that you need out there and that you wish were out there. One thing we’ll be and always will be is a no excuse team, and we’re going to play the guys that we have available. We’re not going to cry about the guys that aren’t here and can’t participate because when they’re healthy, they’ll come back and supply us with the parts that we need. Right now the guys that we have out there are playing as hard as they can and that’s all you can ask for.”
On the Free Throw disparity: "I am trying to figure out a way to say this without getting fined, it was that bad. It really was, it was that bad. I understand that we are playing in Minnesota by 35 - 9, we went to the basket just as much as they did. I think we had 38 attempts in the paint to their 34 and we get 9 free throws, I think that speaks for itself."
"Turnovers were real big today. We had timely ones, I had one late in the game at a time when we were making a run and it made it seven to nine and then a time out. Coach said it after the game, playing hard is not going to be enough all the time. We have to figure out a way to play smart and hard. You can't just be out there with reckless abandon. You want to play that way in certain parts of the game but the 1st quarter and 4th was the big difference."
"You have to find that right line between playing aggressive and making the right play. They are a team that steals the ball a lot, they reach from behind from the help side and slap down on the ball. We had 20 turnovers, we have to find a way to find open spots and open guys."
On shooting troubles: "Give them credit, they played hard and they are a good defensive team. We talked about it before the game. As a team, they play their positions and they help each other out and contest shots. We definitely missed some shots that we make too so it was a combination of both. They got high percentage shots off of our turnovers, they had 32 points off of our turnovers. That is a big, big numbers."
On Kevin Love's game: "He is an All-Star, the thing about those guys is that you can't necessarily stop them but try to make it difficult for them. He got us a lot of times with the pump fake from the free throw line. He got us on that and especially rebounding. They deficiently got to the free throw line a lot... We have to learn from it, we have to watch film and if we play them again so next time we at least compete and not get bullied around and basically punked on the court."
On free throw discrepancy:"You either play basketball or you are an official, I play basketball. Officials are responsible for making their calls and if they feel like it is a foul then so be it. We just got to play. You have to go in there expecting that the refs are not going to give you anything."
On competing every night:"We are competing every game, it was only two or three games, tonight and two games against Chicago, where really we got our butts kicked. Every other game has been close so I don't think that represents the team we are. It is just growing pains and we are going to snap out of it. We have to keep the faith strong and play smart."
Opening statement: "They (Cavs) played hard and they kept coming at you and they did that the whole game until finally the fourth quarter we made some stops. JJ made some big three's to open it up. It's just a win we really needed. We really needed to get something going here and we gutted it out."
On not being a pretty offensive game but Kevin seemed to be back in a groove: "He shot the ball well. Like I said, I'm really not that concerned with it. He was very active tonight and he really made the difference tonight. He got the free-throw line 18 times, so for the most part we were attacking the basket all night long."
On Varejao having 14 boards but only four points: "Both teams were struggling to shoot the ball but you got to keep them off the boards. He still got the 14 boards and four offensive on the glass. He just keeps coming at you. He is a tough one. I thought Kevin did a decent job on him. Watching them, we just saw, they play hard, they keep coming and you just have to grind it out and stay with it."
On changes made after half: "We talked about the fact that we weren't doing much offensively in the second quarter, which affected us at the other end. We started getting really lazy at the defensive end and they made that run and they cut it. Luckily at the end of the second quarter we had a little run to get it back up to seven again. We just have to do a better job; 18 assists and 21 turnovers is not going to do it normally. They had 22 of their points on our turnovers. I thought it wasn't so much what they did but we were just very casual with the ball and made poor decisions."
On Kirilenko tonight: "He is just so active. He had three blocks, four steals and rebounds and assists. He has so many energy plays for us. I thought Dante was terrific in that area too, getting loose balls and running thing down. We have to have that energy."
Are you back feeling good with your shot? "It's one game, I don't want to put too much pressure on myself. Like I said in the postgame, it might 15-20 games to really get back to where I want to be. I said this morning hopefully it's sooner rather than later but we're happy with the win and we just want to take our day off tomorrow and rest our bodies and get ready for Wednesday a few days after that."
On Stopping Varejao: "We game planned for him, we knew he had been playing at a very high level. We just wanted to force him into giving up the ball and making plays himself. We felt we did a good job of that, he's going to get his rebounds because they really play at a fast pace and get a lot of shots up and we didn't make a ton of our shots tonight. There were a lot of balls to be had out there."
CAVALIERS NOTES:
• Tonight's loss drops the Cavs to 4-16 on the season and 2-11 on the road. Cleveland has now dropped eight of nine contests against Western Conference opponents.
• Tonight's 4-point, 14-rebound performance snapped Anderson Varejao's streak of 10 consecutive games of 10+ points, 15+rebounds and 5+ offensive rebounds (most in the league since Moses Malone in 1973-74). Varejao came into tonight ranked 1st in the NBA with 15.6 rebounds per game, averaging 17.4 rpg over his last 10 games.
• Alonzo Gee scored a team-high 16 points (eight in the third quarter) on 7-of-12 shooting. He came into tonight 12.2 ppg over his last five contests.
• Cleveland's bench has outscored Minnesota's 37-25, led by CJ Miles' 13.
•Despite coming into tonight's game ranked last in the NBA in opponent's field goal percentage (48.5%), the Cavs limited the Wolves to 42.9% shooting tonight.