Playoffs 2008 Round 1 Game 6 Quotes

JAZZ COACH JERRY SLOAN
On the game “Houston just kept coming at us. We’d get a lead and they’d come right back in the ball game. That says a lot about what they do and Coach Adelman’s coaching. Fortunately for us we were able to hang in there and get the win. They had beaten us pretty good over there and our guys got ready to play over here. That was exciting for us.”

On Deron Williams “He always pretty much has free reign. Whatever he feels like. Whatever play we run, or shot that he takes and he had a stretch there where he shot the ball very well.”

On the Lakers “One of the teams picked to win it all. We’re going to have our hands full knowing we’ve got to go to their place right off the bat. We have to go play and focus on helping each other and try to play together. We’ll see what we have.”

DERON WILLIAMS
On the game “Yeah, I felt we let a big lead slip away. We had games all series where we had 14 point leads, 15 point leads and they come back and the same thing tonight. It was a little frustrating and I wanted to try and open the game back up and I just got hot. Shots started feeling good so I just let it go.”

On his play in the second half “I wasn’t really looking to score much in the first half and I just wanted to be a little more assertive, a little more aggressive to start the second half.”

On being the leader of this team “That’s my job. As a point guard I feel you have to be an extension of the coach, be a leader out on the floor. I just tried to get guys hyped up for tonight, try to do my Kevin Garnett impersonation, and get guys going cause that’s what we need. If we’re going to beat the Lakers or if we’re going to beat this team tonight we needed everybody playing good. We hadn’t had a game where everybody’s hitting, everybody’s clicking on offense and I think that’s what we needed today and we had that.”

CARLOS BOOZER
On winning the series “We’re past them now, and we have to focus on L.A. and number 24.”

On how the Jazz played against T-Mac “T-Mac was great. He had an incredible second quarter. Obviously he didn’t do as much in the third quarter, but he still had 40 points. That’s why when we got into halftime I said ‘if he has 50 points and we win the game, who cares?’ That’s almost what happened, and we won. Who cares?”

On the next matchup vs. LA “They’re a very good team, very good defensive team. Well coached, [they] move the ball well. We’ll review more of the tape in preparation for Sunday.”

MEHMET OKUR
On winning the game and the series “It feels good. It’s been a good challenge for us. They are some basketball team, I tell you that. They came out there, tried to win every game, but we were able to play good defense especially in the second half and we were able to get tonight’s game. It was fun and at the same time it was a good challenge and we all look forward to play against the Lakers.”

On the Jazz offensive effort tonight “We did a good job on offense this time. We shared the ball, everybody looked at each other and tried to create open shots, so it was fun.”

ROCKETS COACH RICK ADELMAN
On the game “First thing, I just want to congratulate Jerry and his team. Very good team, extremely well coached, came out ready for us tonight. Had that great start, end of the first and start of the second. Our guys responded and we made a game of it at halftime, thanks to Tracy—he was just unbelievable. But then they took control. You’ve got to give them credit. Their better players stepped up, Williams was terrific. Okur stepped up, Boozer…they had the kind of game we had at home in the last one, and we just give them the credit. We just ran out of gas, we couldn’t make another run. I’m very proud of our team.”

On whether he thought they had it after coming back from 20 points down “We got to one point, and it was a four point game at halftime. I thought that it was important that we sustained it in the third quarter. That’s what we had to do. We had to stay close in the third quarter and then I thought we were in the game. But then we lost Rafer just before halftime, and we just didn’t have enough answers for them.”

TRACY MCGRADY
On the game “I thought we did a hell of a job fighting back despite being down 20 something. We came into halftime and realized Rafer wasn’t coming out the second half, things kind of changed. We’re a different ball club when he’s not in our lineup.” “It’s tough, anytime you have a lot of confidence in your team and your chances and you fall short. It’s a hell of a ball club over there. I thought we did some great things to put ourselves in a great situation to try to make this a series.”

On how Deron Williams played “He played well the second half. I thought he stepped up; he was a lot more aggressive in the second half. It seemed like he was feeding off the crowd. He had a little extra pep in his step. He hit some big shots, timely shots.”

SHANE BATTIER
On the game “These guys (Jazz) are really good. There’s a reason why they are 39-5 in this building (EnergySolutions Arena) and to beat them, you have to play a great game and we did that twice and had a chance to do that in Game 4 as well.” “They’re really good. It wouldn’t surprise me if they beat the Lakers next round and gave either the Hornets or the Spurs fits.”

On McGrady stepping up “He (McGrady) didn’t have much help out there. He was great and he’s not the reason why we lost this game. The rest of us couldn’t get anything going and he was a one-man wrecking ball out there; he kept us in the game. If he didn’t do what he did in the first half it would have been even uglier.”