Pelicans Head Coach Alvin Gentry
On 10 straight wins and the teams win tonight:
“I thought we started the game the right way. Once again, I think one of the things we have to get better at is losing our focus some point in the game, because things are going really good for us. We get ourselves in a little trouble that way. We keep regrouping and finding a way to win. That’s the most important thing. We keep talking about, there’s a much bigger goal that we’re trying to accomplish. If we’re going to do that, we have to play against ourselves, not play against the other team. If we’re going to do that, we have to execute. We have to rebound, stay focused on defensive assignments and things like that. It was a good win. It was on the road. Anytime you can win on the road in this league, I think is a good win.”
On Anthony Davis' ankle:
We won’t know anything until tomorrow. They took x-rays, but [they came back negative]. We’ll go back home and I’m sure he’ll have an MRI at some stage tomorrow, then we’ll have more information.”
On Davis' absence on the court and how it affects the flow of the game:
“Our execution is what we didn’t do. Having him out there, we still have to execute, not having him out there we still have to execute. That’s defensively and offensively, I was a little disappointed in that. We’ve just got to continue to try to strive to get better and continue to work. I think the effort is there, we’re playing hard, and we’re doing things. We have to also play smart.”
On Nikola Mirotic's great offensive game tonight:
“Well, he’s been playing well for us. I don’t look at the stats sheet to understand what he brings to our team or how he plays. He did a good job. I thought Ian [Clark] came in and did a good job for us, gave us a lift. Each one played well. Jrue [Holiday] when we really needed him to come through locked in defensively and then scored some big hoops for us. They’ve got some good young pieces here. Buddy [Hield] is a good player. We thought Buddy was a good player. If you’re going to get a guy like DeMarcus [Cousins], you’re going to give up something that you really don’t want to. We love Buddy as a player. He’s not doing anything that we didn’t think he would be able to really do anyway.”
Pelicans Forward Anthony Davis On how his ankle feels:
“I feel fine, but I’ll have the team doctor take a look at it tomorrow and go from there.”
On him staying in the game initially and if it got worse:
“Every time you twist an ankle it hurts, especially when you’re coming down on somebody’s foot because you really don’t have any protection. It was sore and I saw [Rajon] Rondo saying ‘Take a foul,’ and I was just taking a foul. I knew when I saw Cheick [Diallo] going to the table to come get me. I just wanted to make sure everything was fine.”
On Jrue Holiday taking over at the end of the game:
“I think somebody made him mad, that’s what he was saying. He took over the game. Niko [Mirotic] hit some big threes. E’Twaun [Moore] hit some big shots. But even though we won, we have to do a better job of playing better – we didn’t play well at all. We can do that against teams like this, but to better ourselves we have to do a better job – at least when I was in there – to make sure that we execute our gameplans and don’t play down to the level of our competition. We went out there and thought it was going to be an easy game. This team is always to go fight – they always fight, they beat us twice [this season]. They’re going to fight no matter who is on the floor and then they were making shots. We have to learn how when we build a lead to sustain it and increase it.”
On winning on the road recently and being able to go back home:
“We’ve been an up-and-down team at home – we’ve been a better road team. But it feels good to go back home and play in front of our fans again, sleep in our own beds. We have to take care of business. We have some tough teams coming in there starting with Washington on Friday – a team that embarrassed us up in D.C., so we owe them one. But we have to make sure we come out with the same mentality no matter who we’re playing.”
Pelicans Forward Nikola Mirotic On being in a groove this road trip and what he's seeing out there:
“First of all, we were great in all three game – that was the key. I thought we were comfortable shooting. I’ve been doing a lot of extra work to get my confidence back because it was a little struggle at the beginning with my shots. But now, it seems like I did get in that rhythm and my teammates did a great job of finding me tonight. And it’s been fun – winning is always fun – so I’m very happy with tonight.”
On his thoughts of setting the tone to the start of the game and not looking back:
“We did a great job and we knew that it was about us – that we need to set a tone early, that they need to take to the first timeout and that’s what we did. We jumped on them, especially defensively because offensively we’ve been great the last 10 games – scoring a lot of points, sharing the ball. I think we did step up today on the defensive end of the court. And in the second half, without AD [Anthony Davis] we knew that we needed to do a better job as a team, especially rebounding the ball in the paint. Everybody did something so I think it’s all about the team and everybody knows what we need to do and everybody’s contributing something.”