Postgame Quotes: Suns @ Mavs, 12/8/09

(Was their any thought to Nash intentionally missing that 2nd free throw there at the end?) – “No, because there was 3.7 seconds left and I didn’t realize it took us almost 2 seconds to foul, but, hey. But we still would’ve had a chance, we just thought that at some point along the line they would miss a free throw, and they did, and they decided to miss the second one. We had no timeouts left, so in that situation you’ve got to pray that you’ve got Kobe Bryant on your team I guess.”

(On having a shot at the end) “They had a few possessions, they made shots down the stretch with tough defense. They happened to make shots and make free throws for the most part. So it was a hard fought battle out there, a hard fought game.”

(On Josh Howard’s first game back) “Yeah I actually am surprised that he played so well out there on the basketball court in his first game back. He looks like he’s pretty ready to go. He took his time and got healthy, and it showed tonight

(On the offensive performance) “I thought we were close to really playing well offensively. We missed a lot of shots tonight and weren’t really on our A game. So I thought it was better philosophically, and our rhythm was a little better but we didn’t convert.”

“Well he is a remarkable athlete. Hey look, he’s put in an unbelievable amount of work the last month to prepare for this. He rhythm was off a little bit early you could tell, but he was able to get to the free throw line a couple times and created contact and made some free throws and got into the game that way. Then in the second half, we hit a spell there where he was the only offense we had going. He really kept us afloat. It shows you how important he is to our team and he just showed a lot of guts tonight too. Because he was tired and you could tell he was a little sore too. He brings a certain type for force to our game. He is the best cutter that we have. He is a great runner and he is probably our best driver. He is a dead-eye shooter from mid range and he makes spot up threes. So, he is invaluable you know, because all those things come into play over the course of our games somehow or another. When you have Kidd throwing the ball ahead, you have to have guys that can do something with it. When you have Dirk in a double team you better have guys that can make shots. You know, so we are a running team and we got to have guys that can shoot open shots in transition and also get it to the rim and get to the free throw line and that is one of the things that was missing in the Memphis game. We got into a jump shooting mode and we didn’t have a drive game and Josh is a big part of our drive game.”

On the play of JJ Barea...

“J.J. played extremely well and this was a matchup driven decision to start him. He is matched up and has played well against this team and early again, he kept us going again early when we were struggling. I thought that he did battle hard. Nash is an extremely difficult guy to guard obviously. But, his combination of offense and energy helped us.”

On the end of the game...

“Well you know, ya it works. But then you got to get back and make free throws and then you got to get a rebound. There is a lot going on. But our guys did a great job in the last minute. I mean they hit three extremely difficult shots. Richardson’s three, he makes it look relatively easy, but I’m telling you that is a brutally hard shot and then Nash hit two that he makes look routine. You know, that team has got some of the best shot makers you will ever see in this game and there execution was great, so we had to make sure we were making free throws and doing the right things defensively from a strategic standpoint. You know, Jet’s (Jason Terry’s) intentional miss at the free throw was a huge play because he grazed the rim in such a way where Stoudemire had to kind of double-hitch and then put it on the floor and that probably burned a half a second or a quarter of a second which in that situation when you are flinging up a 65-foot shot it makes a difference. So, you had to be precise to win the game tonight.”

(What did you guys try to do defensively against them tonight?) – “What we tried to do is make them take tough two’s and not open three’s. You’ve got to run them off the line, you’ve got to contest Nash’s shots and want to limit the easy buckets for Stoudemire and I thought we did a decent job. Our defense has been pretty good over the first 22 games. Surprisingly our offense has been really struggling and we’ve had to find ways to score for effectively and in the first half tonight we shot just 35 percent again so we’ve got to find a way to get better shots. We’ve got to knock our shots down. It really help tonight to have Josh (Howard) back out on the floor and his ability to take guys off the dribble which he did a good job of tonight. He hit some big shots for us tonight and had some big plays so it was definitely good to see him back and once he gets a good rhythm going we’ll be a really tough team to beat.”