That's What He Said - vs Wizards, 4/16/14

Celtics 102

Brad Stevens

Re: What he told his team after the game:
"At halftime, I was obviously disappointed in our defensive effort. I knew, just look out there, we were undermanned a little bit, but I thought we could play better defensively and it thought we came out in the second half with a great deal of spirit and fight, a little bit more aggressiveness, and it was great until we were worn out. And I thought we wore out and we didn’t have any juice in the last 10 minutes or so, prior to that little run at the end. Credit them; they put us in a world of hurt in a lot of different match-ups. It’s a good basketball team who’s playing well right now, who, as I said earlier, is really sitting pretty for the future because they’ve got really good players at the one and the two that are both very young, that have a chance to be elite at their positions."

Re: What he wants his players to take away from the season:
"So there’s a couple different ways to look at it: are you going to get better in your role, or are you going to expand your role? What I mean by that is: are you going to get better at what you do well, or are you going to get better at some other things that make you, that give you the chance to instead of be the eighth guy be the fifth guy, instead of be the fifth guy be the third guy. We have a lot of great data to be able to share and subjective thoughts as well, and I think we can get better with the guys in the room. I think we clearly are going to need to add to our team to be better, but I told them at halftime, I said, ‘We can start it on October 1st or we can start it right now.’ That is, we’ve got to have a defensive DNA to start next season at a little bit different level than I thought we did at the end of this season. I thought we tried to compete defensively early-on in the year; I didn’t think we made the strides that I would’ve liked to have made."

Re: Why Brandon Bass deserved the Red Auerbach Award:
"The reason, and I just told him this in front of the team, he’s as good of a pro as we have. He shows up every day, he’s the first one to the gym on the road, he’s the first one to the gym at home, he takes care of his body as well or better than any of our players on our team nutrition-wise, stretching-wise, in the weight room. And his individual workouts are deliberate to what applies to making his game good. And I don’t think everybody that works on the game anywhere in the world do those things as well as some of the best pros, and I think we need to really embrace that deliberate work-ethic all around the way and Brandon Bass is a great example of that for our team."

Re: Lasting impressions from this group of Celtics:
"I think we can get better. I think we can get better. Unlike, you would think at the end of a season like this, I’m not concerned that we aren’t going to strive to get better, if that makes sense. I think we will work, I think their work-ethics are good, I think their coachability is pretty good, and I think that the one thing that they never really did, you know maybe here or there, there was a line or two, you all know better than I do because you’re the ones asking them, they never really splintered. Things like th is can splinter you pretty easily, and they stayed together pretty well as far as standing up for one another and being a team and not pointing blame, and it’s been a pretty good group from that regard, and that gives you a chance to improve. You know, it’s the old adage that you can’t improve without accountability, so that gives you a chance moving forward."


Rajon Rondo

Re: What he takes away from the loss:
"Motivation for next year. We have a lot to work on and I look forward to next year."

Re: This year's Celtics team:
"A good group to play with and a lot of great guys. A lot of young guys just trying to be better."

Re: Not allowing the team's record to get to him:
"You have to take it one game at a time. Everything counts. We don’t have time to feel sorry for ourselves."

Re: Having a tight-knit group from start to finish:
"It shows the group of guys we have. It starts with Danny Ainge and it starts with Brad Stevens. We had guys like Chris Babb and Chris Johnson to come help us and help brighten their future."

Re: If he will watch the playoffs:
"No."

Re: Brandon Bass winning the Red Auerbach Award:
"I think it is well deserved, he is a great guy and great teammate and very unselfish. It's a great accomplishment for Brandon (Bass)."

Re: How it felt to have Boston Marathon survivors at the arena:
"Everywhere you go you know that Boston sports mean a lot to this city. It's not just one team, one fan. We take much pride to play for this city. It means a lot."

Re: Being a team leader:
"Every team is different. This is new, me being the only guy here back (from) when Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce were here. It's still no different. I still think I have been involved. Danny Ainge has always been in communication with me and what he has planned and what he has in store for this team."


Avery Bradley

Re: The season:
"I feel like everybody got better on both sides of the floor. Even though it was a tough year you can always stay positive from this year. I think everybody in this locker room can say that they improved their game through out the season."

Re: Staying positive:
"It was big, I want to stay more for the older guys, helping us younger guys stay positive every single day. Coming into the gym and putting in work I take my hat off to them because they came in everyday with a positive attitude. They helped everybody stay positive every single day and every practice."

Re: How he improved during the season:
"I think I improve both ends of the floor you know by playing hard that was my main force and I think I have been playing pretty well."


Wizards 118

Randy Wittman

Re: Thoughts on the regular season:
"Well, I just thought the way we ended it; that’s what we talked about. We didn’t want to worry about who’s chasing who, I think they know that well enough being involved every day in the situation of where you stand. I really wanted them to really focus on themselves and worry about, like I told you guys before the game, what we can control. I thought they did a great job, I think we went 7-3 the last 10, 4 in a row; that’s the way you want to finish. If we just took care of ourselves we knew that we’d be fine. It ends up now that we are the 5th seed now with Brooklyn (Nets) losing. We’ve talked all year long each time, especially in the Eastern Conference when you are playing a team and the situation before a game, after a game about season series and how important; in 82 games sometimes when you play 3 games against one team it doesn’t seem that valuable but that’s what came into play with us. We win the tiebreaker because we won the season series; the guys took really good focus on that each and every time we played knowing what the series was, where it was at and about winning as many series as we could. Its just a process of them learning what its all about."

Re: The serious tone at shootaround:
"I could tell that they were in tune. Again I thought we had a little bit of lapse from a standpoint and scored so easy that sometimes take the foot off the throttle a little bit. I give Boston credit they had a lot of guys out, they didn’t quit, they kept fighting and I think Brad (Stevens) has done a heck of a job for his first season here with these guys and he’s got a lot of good young players."

Re: All of the Wizards' players contributing:
"We were high energy from everybody, we even got Al (Harrington) stitched up there in the first half, he threw a little blood out there too. Again a team effort. I thought Bradley (Beal) had a good all-around game. I thought he worked as hard as I’ve seen him work defensively for the entire game and he’s learning position, what he can do and what he can’t do as he continues to grow."

Re: Preparing for Chicago:
"We’ll talk about all that tomorrow with the team, but obviously we got an extra day getting to play on Sunday which is good. We’ll get back on the plane right now and as coaches now we know who we are playing finally and have an opportunity to break things down and go from there."

Re: Washington's mindset heading into the playoffs:
"Mindset is to go in there and win the series, that’s the only mindset you should have. We’ve played this team (Chicago) the last two years extremely well; we are 2-1 against them this year. They came in and smacked us pretty good last game so that should be a good fresh wound on our guys the message that they sent us last time we played them. Your mindset is to go in there and win, you win 4 games and to win 4 games you got to win the first one and you got to get that first win and that’s what I want our guys to think."


Trevor Ariza

Re: Looking forward to the playoffs:
"I thought we had a pretty good season. We had our ups we had our downs, but for the most part its definitely been a step in the right direction for this franchise. We made the playoffs after a long time of bad droughts. Everything this year has been more positive than negative. Im happy for this organization and happy for the players that’s been here throughout the drought. And we’re just going to try to win some games in this playoff."

Re: There being a serious tone for Washington tonight:
"At this point in time, that’s the approach you have to take. There’s serious, there’s really really serious now that were in the postseason. To give ourselves a chance we have to lock in early. I feel like that’s what we tried to do."

Re: Looking at the NBA scoreboard during the game:
"I didn’t even know where the other scores were. So I wasn’t."

Re: It feeling good to finish as the five-seed in the East:
"It definitely does. We started off early that we could be a top three team in the Eastern Conference. Unfortunately we didn’t achieve that goal, but I think that when you give yourself a chance to finish anywhere between five or whatever, its always a good thing. Tonight we controlled the whole thing, so I think that’s a good thing too."

Re: Playing the Bulls in the first round:
"Well they're a great defensive team. They definitely, definitely sit down on the defensive end. They play hard all the time, so if we can match their intensity and energy in the game, we can give ourselves a chance."


Bradley Beal

Re: Taking care of business:
"First of all, it was great for us to come out, focus, get out to a great start. Coming out with John (Wall) in the first six or so. From there we just took off, they went on a little run, got it within six to four at one point, but we ended up getting the lead back up and maintaining it. It was a great close out for us."

Re: Heading into the playoffs with a good mindset:
"Definitely. I think we have a lot of confidence. We’re happy where were at and how we’re playing. It’s all about our defense. We’re playing tremendous defense right now and as long as we continue to do that we’re going to finish pretty well."

Re: Getting hot early:
"The offense is always going to be there. We take advantage of shots that we had. Guys are just shooting the ball with confidence. I don’t think we passed up any open shots, we just took them, and fortunately for us we knocked them down. Like I said, it starts with our defense and we get out in transition, get what we want, and move the ball offensively."

Re: Looking at the NBA scoreboard during the game:
"Yeah, I cant see that far though. I just wanted to focus on the game and concentrate on winning."



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