See what the Brooklyn Nets had to say after their 117-114 loss to the Milwaukee Bucks.
STEVE NASH
On Giannis Antetokounmpo making outside shots:
“I think we could live with that. What we can’t live with is all the dunks, offensive rebounds, transition buckets. You live with the shooting. Here we are, he had 50 and we have a shot to tie, we didn’t play well. Although he was sensational tonight, I think the game plan was fine. It’s about all the other things that we can clean up in order to give ourselves a better chance.”
On matchup without James Harden:
“I’m not so much worried about what they know. For us, we have the luxury of talent. We have great players. We don’t have the luxury of time. That’s OK. We understand that and we’ll work around that. James will give us a totally different dimension, but we don’t sit here and say, ‘well, wait ‘til James gets back.’ We try to solve the puzzle now. James will give us obviously something great to build on, but we can look at all the things that we did wrong today and there were a lot of things where I thought we just weren’t sharp tonight. We clean some of those things up, I think we give ourselves a better chance.”
On Jrue Holiday and Milwaukee defense:
"We all know he's an elite defender. I think we got a little stagnant at times; we need to move and play together. At times maybe we are too stagnant, we didn't make them make enough decisions or make them guard in space. They were able to put us in positions where they can use their length, strength and defensive schemes to make it difficult on us. We can play better, we can move the ball better, we can make them make quick decisions and make different judgments along the way that stack the deck in our favor. I think we weren’t really sharp in that.”
KYRIE IRVING
On offense down the stretch:
“I think you’ve just got to give credit. Everybody’s a professional basketball player out there that wants to win, going to do everything possible to limit our opportunities both teams. I think we give them credit in terms of getting stops down the stretch. We feel pretty comfortable in terms of the shots we got as well. Very makeable shots. A lot of 50-50 basketballs. If we stop fouling down the stretch — or that one foul we had on Jrue Holiday — just limiting them to just one-possession shots, feel like we would be in better position. But you’ve got to give credit to them and we feel comfortable about the shots we got as well.”
On Nets vs. Bucks matchup:
“You’re watching a show. You’re watching a lot of great players make shots. A pleasure to watch a lot of greatness out there. When you’re participating in it, you want to make shots as well. On nights like this, some of the easy ones that I missed, or our team missed, we would love to complement Kevin and making the game easy for him. He carried us the majority of the way. Giannis carried them, Khris Middleton carried them as well. But to see a magnificent show like that, it’s truly an honor. It’s greatness on the court.”
On Nets turnovers:
"They definitely picked up the physicality in terms of shrinking the floor. Whenever me and K had isos, they were showing two bodies, three bodies, contesting everything, and when we have our guys on the perimeter, we’ve just gotta be ready to make plays, attack those closeouts and knock down shots, be ready to knock down shots and we’ll be OK. So like I said, you give a lot of credit to the defense and the athleticism, but at the same time we’ve just got to play a mature game in terms of taking care of possessions."
KEVIN DURANT
On offense during Milwaukee's fourth-quarter run:
"I think it was a case of hitting a cold shooting streak. I mean, you’ve got to give them credit. They’re a long, athletic team. But I think for the most part, a lot of our turnovers were self-inflicted and it got them out in transition. They got comfortable shooting the ball tonight. You’ve got to give them some respect, coming out and shooting the ball the way that they did, and we made it easier for them by giving them turnovers."
On Nets vs. Bucks matchup:
"Of course, you want to gauge yourself against the best defender, best team defense, best coaching. That’s the only way you’ll get better as a player. So I get excited and I relish these opportunities and we do as a team. I think tonight you’ve got to give credit to Milwaukee for just making more shots than we did. I mean, you look at it across the board, and it was an even game outside of they made more shots than us. So it’s one of those games you enjoy playing in, and hopefully, it’s a better one for us next game."
On No. 1 seed vs. getting ready for playoffs:
"Every day you wake up, it should be about your craft. I think that’s how everybody approaches this thing. We try to take it a day at a time, a possession at a time. We can’t control what’s going to happen at the end of the season or what other teams are going to do. I think we’ve just got to take advantage of each one and that’s what we’re doing. Guys are locked in. We’re talking the game when we’re at practice, on the bus, we talk about it on the plane. So I think that helps as well. We’re staying locked in mentally too when we do it."