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| Monday, March 9, 2009 Final Score: Atlanta 89, New Orleans 79 Hornets Post Game Quotes
“The second quarter was awful. I thought our guys did a terrible job in that period, giving up offensive rebounds and layups. Whatever we could do wrong offensively in the second quarter we did. For our starters to play the minutes they’re playing, we have to try and come out and win these games.” “We are going to have to evaluate some things and get some additional productivity of the bench. It’s not too late, they have to show the initiative to go in and play, and show that they want to compete.” “We’ve put a lot of pressure on David, Rasual and Chris, those guys are playing heavy minutes out of necessity, because we aren’t getting the production out of the bench. We have to show more pride when we come into the game to hold down the fort. The offensive end comes second.”
“They did a good job on us. They are all pretty much the same size, and they did a great job with scrambling on defense. They did a good job rotating and keeping us out of our sets, and away from the basket. They kept us out of rhythm.” “They switch across the board and they come at you with 6-7, 6-8 guys or better who are all athletic, and it caused problems for us tonight.” “Their scrambling caused some mismatches for us and made things difficult.”
“They didn’t do anything special on defense, we just couldn’t guard them. We didn’t put together enough stops at any stretch to beat this team. When we aren’t getting quality shots, our defense has to be tougher.” “They were able to do whatever they wanted, and we just didn’t do enough defensively. We didn’t come in with the right mindset. We know Joe Johnson is the guy and we weren’t able to put the clamps on him.” Hawks Post Game Quotes
“We got off to a slow start. That could be because we tinkered with the lineup. I thought for the most part, once we got going, our defense picked up. You hold this team to 79 points, you’ve got to give credit to our defense.” “With Marvin being out, and we talked about it this morning at shootaround, guys like Acie and Solomon will have opportunities to play, and we’re going to need them the rest of the way.” “We had our hands full with Chris Paul. The supporting cast from a defensive standpoint, we talked about building a wall and getting back…and we did a good job on that, of not giving them easy baskets over the top. Joe had a lot to do with that.” “Everybody that came off the bench was solid. Flip played a solid game, but to see Acie and Solomon, guys who hadn’t played a lot of minutes lately, to step in and give us positive minutes was huge tonight.” “This is what we worked towards, starting out the season with 14-of-22 on the road. Then we hit December with a bunch of home games, and that gave us a nice little cushion. We hit a lull the last couple months in terms of trying to maintain. So this is a month-and-a-half we were looking towards. It’s a lot better playing at home than playing on the road for us. Our fans have been great.”
“This came at a good time for us. We need to be home and we need to take care of business.” On playing without Marvin: “Coach really emphasized that before the game, that we needed to pick up the slack. We can’t go a perfect season without an injury or something. We just all have to rally together, and pick up for Marvin. It’s hard to replace a guy like him.” On Chris Paul: “What’s dangerous with him is when he gets into the lane, and also when he gets everybody else involved. But I think we did a really good job of keeping him out of the lane, and making it tough on all the other guys on the team to get shots up.”
“It feels good, coming out and playing in a playoff atmosphere, playing against a good playoff team. For us to respond the way we responded, with Marv going down, other guys stepping up, and that’s how we have to play.” On Marvin’s absence: “We have to do this collectively as a team. It’s not going to be an individual thing. We all have to work together.” On guarding Chris Paul: “I had a lot of help from my teammates. I just tried to make every shot tough for him. When he did get in the lane, stay down off his pump fakes. When he did try to shoot over me, I always tried to contest. So I was just trying to get a hand in his face every time.” |
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