Detroit: Maurice Cheeks | Andre Drummond
Memphis: Dave Joerger | Ed Davis | Tayshaun Prince
(On execution): “As a coach, when things like that – ball movement happens or doesn’t happen – that’s up to me. I have to do a better job of trying to figure out how to get the ball from one side to the other. That’s on me. That’s not on them. I have to do a better job of trying to get that ball moved from one side to the other.”
(On rotation): “Just trying to keep the guys I think give us the best chance to win at that particular time. If someone jumps up and is able to come in the game and play, I’m not opposed to it.”
(On a frustrating second half): “It hurt; it definitely hurt, playing in that second half. All the hard work we put in these past few days to just fall short like that and let them come out and do what they did in the second half; and come out with the win was definitely tough to swallow with the rest of the game going on.
(On the fourth quarter): “I play hard any time I touch the floor. I do what I need to do when I am on the floor; and that’s be the energy guy. That’s what I try to bring to this team but when I got back on the floor in the fourth quarter I tried to boost us up a little bit and play hard.”
(On second half): "We committed to defending a little better and keeping the ball out of the paint. The numbers at halftime were a lot of effort points and fast break points. Those are things you can control somewhat with your effort so we tried to do a better job of being much more active, giving them one shot and out, executing our offense and using more energy to get back in transition."
(On Pistons days off): "I think we caught them on a night where it is hard in professional basketball to have a long layoff in four, five or six days after playing 15 in 23."
(On Jon Leuer): "We are in Big Ten country so he stepped up but he made some shots. Also, he did a nice job of getting inside the zone when they would go zone and we were passing it around the perimeter. He got into the middle of the paint so now they are wondering about the zone. ‘Should I come up?’ And that opens up Jared Bayless for a kick out and Mike Conley gets a kick out."
(On game): "In the first half we kept it close. We got a late push and in the third and fourth quarters we got stops, and it was a wrap."
(On bench play): "As a bench unit that's our main focus; to come in and give our offense a big spread and bring energy. We wanted to pick up the slack and we've got good bench players. We're out there to produce and win the game."
(On game): "Shots were available, shots were there, we were moving the ball. Obviously with Tony Allen being out we had to pick each other up. We made plays and shots were there. You're not going to get the same good looks every night, but tonight we had them."
(On facing former team): "It's always special playing against your former teammates. You always have the incentive to hopefully go out there and get a team win. What this team does a great job of is when somebody is facing their former team, everybody steps up to the challenge and tries to help them out. We were able to do that today.”