(On the game tonight): "I shouldn't have to say much, probably only two words-offensive rebounding. I'm not talking about our offensive rebounding. I'm talking about giving up 22 offensive rebounds. If you look at the stat sheet, offensively, we probably should have won the game. If you give a team like that 22 offensive rebounds, you make it very tough on yourselves. That was our message to the guys."
(On what caused them to give 22 offensive rebounds): "Effort, physicality of the game, and not boxing out. They were more physical and more aggressive. Rebounding has nothing to do with skill or talent; it just has to do with a mindset. Like I said to our guys, we did a lot of good things tonight on both ends of the floor, but when you give up 22 offensive rebounds that means they get 22 chances to score and it makes it that much harder on you to defend it. Again, it's a mindset. That team was aggressive and physical and every time the shot went up they went after it. We did a terrible job of boxing out and a terrible job of pursuing the ball."
(On coming out flat after two good practices): "I didn't think we came out flat. I thought the effort was pretty good. We have got a saying, and one of our defensive philosophies is ‘complete the play'. We didn't complete the defensive play. When the shot went up, we did a pretty good job initially on defense and then everybody just relaxed. They pursued the ball and were much more physical and aggressive as far as attacking the ball. We didn't do a good job of completing the defense and that is something that we talk about all the time."
(On the play of J.J. Hickson): "I thought, in the second half, I wasn't getting what I needed from him, so I went with the other guys."
(On being inserted into the game to give the team a change of pace): "Coach always tells me that when he puts me in the game, he puts me in the game for energy. He only had to tell me once and that stuck with me. Every time I go in there, I always try my best to keep my man off the glass and try to help in that department. When they throw it down low to me, I feel like I have an advantage and I'm going to try and score. That's what I like to do."
(On to Rockets' second chance opportunities tonight): "That's what coach talked about when we got into the locker room, the second chance opportunities that they had. Me and the other bigs kind of took it upon ourselves that we did a poor job tonight of keeping them off the glass."
(On Chuck Hayes having rebounding success tonight): "That's what Chuck Hayes does. He's one of those guys that's 6'5", about 260, he's playing the center position and people wonder how (he does it). Tonight, when he got 17 rebounds, with about nine or 10 on the offensive end, he just showed he has a nose for the ball. He moves around, is a great defender and just does all of the dirty work."
(On the loss tonight): "Any loss is frustrating. It was definitely a game that we could have won. We are going to take from it, get better and move on from this game."
(On if not boxing out was the cause of being out-rebounded): "It's not just boxing out. It's a team effort because we will get in situations where we have to rotate or scramble and the guards have to come in and take the bigs off of the glass. It's a team effort. It wasn't just a one-on-one matchup between Chuck and me or J.J. (Hickson) or Samardo (Samuels). It was a team effort and we have to get better as a whole."
HEAD COACH RICK ADELMAN
(Opening Statement): "In the second half, we finally started playing harder. We just did not defend in the first half at all. We talked about how they were playing and pushing the ball and fortunately we scored a lot ourselves. In the second half, we did a much better job of contesting them until the last 30 second when they got those eight points, but in the second half we defended them a lot better."
(On Budinger attacking the rim being a point of emphasis): "We have always talked about that. I think this is more of a wide-open game and he had a lot of opportunities to put in on the floor. What I really liked about him was that he was really aggressive and he did it at key times in the game. When they cut it to two points or to four points, he attacked the basket a couple of times and got layups. We have gotten a lot of contributions from him and Courtney (Lee) and obviously Chuck (Hayes) was huge on the boards which got us second chances all night long."
CHUCK HAYES
(On the play of the bench tonight): "Our bench played huge. Chase (Budinger) came off of the bench and practically saved us and Courtney (Lee), just his activity and his ability to get to the basket, was huge for us. They did their job and they gave us a spark and we got the win."
CHASE BUDINGER
(On the difference in the Rockets' play in the second half): "(Playing defense) was an emphasis coming in at halftime. We let them score 65 points (in the first half) and for a team that averages under 100, that is just giving up way too much. Our emphasis coming into halftime was to stop them on the defensive end."
(On getting to the basket more tonight): "I have been making it more of a goal to attack the basket instead of just settling for jumpers. Also, a team like that does not really have any shot-blocking. They are not a shot-blocking team, so it just gave me more confidence in attacking the rim."