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Pistons vs. Thunder
Postgame Quotes - October 30, 2009
Regular Season Game #2

Detroit: John Kuester | Ben Gordon | Charlie Villanueva
Oklahoma City: Scott Brooks | Nick Collison

Pistons Head Coach John Kuester
(On the game)
“It was almost in the first half that we were so excited about playing that we could never get into a flow, even though we had the lead, it was almost like fool's gold. I thought what hurt us the most was our energy level in the third period. Here, you have a nice little lead going into the third quarter and we didn't have the flow that we needed. Defensively at times we did an outstanding job, but we couldn't get a flow offensively. We had some guys, if you had seen us play the night before, we were sharing the ball, setting screens, getting people good looks, things that we reverted back to at times during training camp where it was too much one on one. We'll get better. This is a great group of guys that knew after the game, that the third period with the turnover and the pace that we had that we needed to step it up and we just didn't.”

(On the Thunder’s defense)
“Truthfully, they played good defense, but we allowed them to play good defense because we didn't have any ball movement and we didn't execute. I think that's why we have to do a better job of when we are in the situation where we have to make them play defense from one side of the court to the other. It was two, one-pass attack; as opposed to three-or-four attacks.”

(On Oklahoma)
“They knocked down timely shots, that's one of things that they did, is they kept their poise and Krstic can make those shots, Collison made a couple. All of those shots were very crucial situations because we were right there. All of a sudden we missed a few timely free throws to cut it to four or three and all of a sudden the game has a different completion. We just couldn't get over the hump at the end, but I thought we did things in the fourth quarter to put ourselves in the position to win, but we just didn't sustain it.”

Pistons Guard Ben Gordon
(On Richard Hamilton)
“I think it did. He obviously is a huge part of this team. To start the game we had some decent offensive plays but in the second half we became stagnant and we stopped moving the ball like we did in the first half. Everything was a one-or-two pass shot.”

(On the Pistons)
“I think we need to play off of each other, and use everyone on the floor as a playmaker at times. We need to rely on each other as a team and not so much as individuals.”

Pistons Forward Charlie Villanueva
(On the game)
"We started out the game pretty well. I think that third quarter is what cost us. I think offensively we got a little stagnant. We were one pass shy. We didn’t move the basketball and we got away from what we did in the first half.”

(On the second half)
“We lost focus, it was like a snowball affect. Guys were getting frustrated or what not. But that’s the good thing about the NBA, we can get past this, we can put this game behind us and concentrate on tomorrow (Milwaukee).”

(On missed shots)
“The whole team, it just seemed like we couldn’t make a shot. It seemed like there was a lid on the rim. It’s a learning process and it’s a long season and we just have to learn from all the things we did wrong.”



Thunder Head Coach Scott Brooks
(On the game)
“We play with a great passion for the game and before every game the message that I give to our guys is: get past yourself. Did you play hard tonight? Did you play for your teammates? Things aren’t going to go well throughout a 48-minute game you just have to stick together. We did that tonight. We had some stretches where it wasn’t good in the first half but we stuck together and everybody chipped in. I am happy for James (Harden) coming in and doing a very good job on Ben Gordon. That is one of the tougher two guards in this league and Russell (Westbrook) competed and Kevin Durant rebounded. Everybody chipped in.”

Thunder Forward Nick Collison
(On the team)
“We all do things a little differently and we complement each other well. Nenad (Krstic) is such a solid shooter he takes up so much space. He is doing a good job. We got a good rotation going early.”

(On their win)
“I think we got one of our better wins since I’ve been here just in terms of being able to hold a team off and get stops when we needed them in the fourth quarter. We kind of never gave up that bad spurt when a team made a run on us. That is what we struggled with in the past.”

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