Posted: Dec 16 2008 12:30AM
Terry Porter | 
Shaq | 
Steve Nash | 
Mike D'Antoni |
Nate Robinson | 
Al Harrington |
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| Terry Porter
“Another solid win for us at home tonight. We got some big efforts tonight from Steve, Amar’e, and Shaq both our big guys did a good job of taking advantage of the mismatches they had in the post and in the paint, really doing a good job on the boards. We knew they were going to keep coming at us, knew they were going to shoot a lot of threes. We went through stretches there where we couldn’t find a rhythm, but all in all I was real pleased the way we played down the stretch. Guys made plays and on the bright side we only had 13 turnovers again tonight so that has been two games where we have really limited our turnovers and it has been good to see that.”
(On matching up with their up tempo game)
“We knew they were going to maintain their speed and tempo, but we also knew we had to throw it into the post and see what they were going to do and really try to punish them down there and see if we can get the ball to take it out of the net more often than us turnover or miss shots. Thought we had a better chance a getting back, setting our D as opposed to misses or turnovers.”
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| Shaq
(On the game)
“It was a nice win – we made a couple of mistakes down the stretch and any D’Antoni team will be a dangerous team – they have a lot of young and aggressive shooters over there but we pulled it out.”
(On his free throws)
“I’ve been practicing and I know that’s going to be a strategy (to send me to the line), so I’ve changed my form a little bit and have been working on it.”
(On the team’s improvement)
“We’re just playing well and we just need to pick it up on our defense and be consistent about what we do. We can’t let teams go on runs like the Knicks had, so if we continue to do that we’ll be fine.”
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| Steve Nash
(On Coach D’Antoni’s reception)
“I was proud to be a Suns player and a Phoenician – to hear the response Mike got. I thought it was a classy response after a little bit of controversy in his exit. People really needed to brush that aside and really look at what he contributed to this city and franchise and how much fun we’ve had over the last four years – so I thought it was very deserved and very classy on the part of the Phoenix fans.”
(On the game)
“We did a pretty nice job for the most part. We had some moments where we couldn’t deal with the stuff they were throwing at us defensively, or at least at a rate we should have considering how many advantages we had, but that’s a part of growing and we still put up some points and won another game at home against a team that was really rolling.”
(On speeding up the offense)
“I think we’re finding a better balance. Terry has encouraged us to get back to running the way we did last year and moving the ball and playing at the pace and tempo that benefits our talent, and at the same time we can go into Shaquille and use him since he’s been playing really well.”
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| Mike D'Antoni
“I love the way we played. We had opportunities to win. We didn’t make our threes obviously and we had to shoot a pretty good percentage to beat these guys. But overall I’m really excited. I thought the way we played and how hard we played it was a good measuring stick for us.
(On the ovation)
These guys, you guys are great. I’ll definitely be back every time. It was really nice. Just seeing the players again…it was good. (On Steve saying hi before the game) Well, I don’t like it because he’s in the other uniform and he put the dagger in us at the end. But I’ve seen it a thousand times. I knew it was going to happen. It didn’t surprise me.”
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| Nate Robinson
“We just have to knock down shots. I just want to win. He’s a winning coach and he brings a positive attitude to the game. It’s something that the players love. They love a coach that has confidence in them. The way coach helps us by giving us confidence by playing together as a team, we’re playing for each other instead of playing for ourselves.
(Down the stretch)
We didn’t make the shots. The shots were there. We had a couple of easy ones that we missed, including myself. But sometimes, you live by the three, you die by the three.”
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| Al Harrington
(On missing so many three pointers)
“We couldn’t make any. I know I missed my fair share. I had a lot of good looks but a lot of my shots were long. Wish I could get them all back. I felt this was the difference in us winning and losing the game for all of us. If we could have made a couple of more, we could have won the game.
Seems like it took us a while to get off the blocks but once we did, I think we won every quarter. You can’t give a good team a cushion like that. And when Shaq is making free throws like that, you know you’re in trouble. Take your hat off to him. He made his free throws and that helped them win tonight.”
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