Pelicans Coach Monty Williams
On the second half:
“Yeah, the thing we hung our hat on last night couldn’t do it tonight as well as we would have liked to. Our defense, and they hit some tough shots, I mean a lot of their threes in the second half had a contested hand, late clock threes, the last shot that Monta hit down the lane threw the ball up in the air 15 feet and comes down all net. We couldn’t get the timely stops that we needed. I thought our energy coming out of the third quarter or half time wasn’t great tonight; those four or five first possessions were vanilla, as we say in our locker room. And we didn’t have purposeful possessions then, and then it set the tone for the rest of that quarter. But, off of a back to back against a team like that, I thought we fought our tails off. AD and Drew were great tonight, Ryan was good getting to the free throw line, Omer was dominate on the boards, we just couldn’t stop them in the second half and gave up 65 points.”
On the ability to change up defense against Monta Ellis:
“Yeah, we did. We were trying to switch it, and we would drive around our guys. When he’s going to the basket like that, he’s hard to stop. I wasn’t worried about that; I was worried about the threes that we gave up. One time AD had Monta on the wing and was three second on the clock, and he just shot it and that was a tough one to swallow. He was trying to do the right thing and keep Monta in front of him, but I don’t think he was aware of the clock. That stuff happens in the game, but Monta was great tonight. Then Devin Harris had 20 off the bench, I thought his threes, we had a hand up, he just hit tough shots.”
On the emotion of a game like this:
“Our guys are frustrated, they just lost. We won a big game last night, we lose on the road. We had a chance to beat a really good team on their home floor, and we didn’t get it done. So, our guys feel bad.”
On Anthony staying in the game after tweaking his foot:
“No, he was fine. He didn’t want to come out, and I wasn’t wanting to take him out either. So, I’m never going to put him in harms way. Unless I see that look in his eyes, and I’ve been around him long enough to know when I should take him out. He jammed his toe; he said he couldn’t feel his toenail or something like that. But, I think he was okay.”
Pelicans forward Anthony Davis:
On his foot after limping on the court near the end of the game:
“It hurts, but it’ll be fine.”
On the deciding minutes of the game:
“We just had a couple of miscommunications at the end of the game. Monta (Ellis) came up and got two layups, and that was just miscommunication. I think our defense was pretty good and they just hit a lot of tough shots and a lot of threes, so hats off to them. We played a tough game.”
On the team’s overall defensive effort tonight:
“We’ve just got to defend. Like I said we had a couple of lapses, especially down the stretch. We can’t afford to do that. We have to hang our hats on playing hard each and every night. We’ll be fine. We just gave ourselves a chance to win. Ryan (Anderson) had a good look at the end and that’s where we want the ball to go, he just missed it. We had an opportunity to tie the game. I think we played well.”
Pelicans forward Ryan Anderson:
On missing the potential game-tying shot:
“That’s a shot I feel confident in making, but as has happened very much lately my shot went in and out. It’s frustrating for me, but obviously coach had enough confidence in me to take that shot and my teammates did as well. It’s a shot I’ll usually make, but not tonight.”
On the Mavericks converting on big plays at the end of the game:
“Guys made big plays down the stretch, for both teams. We had to find a way to fight our way back into the game in that fourth quarter. Obviously the crowd and the momentum was shifting, and we did a good job of maintaining and answering. Like you said, they hit some big shots. Devin Harris hit some big threes and made some big plays.”