November 12th, 2006 | AmericanAirlinesArena | Miami HEAT - 72 | Houston Rockets - 94
HEAT Head Coach Pat Riley
On the game:
“It was two different halves for us. I thought our defense and schemes were good in the first half. They weren’t shooting the ball well and then when it got into the 60’s is when the game was decided. They got three hoops in a row and got it to 10. From 10 on, Tracy (McGrady) and Yao (Ming) made every single play and it just went. Tracy was great in the fourth and Yao was a load. We got our heads handed to us in the second half.”
On the performance of Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady:
“They do a great job. It’s a little bit like watching Shaq and Dwyane (Wade) when they are on their game. The one thing (Yao) has is that he makes turn around jumpers. In the fourth quarter we over reacted to Tracy’s pick-and-roll plays. Instead of playing him like we normally play him, we started to change up things.”
On the HEAT’s defensive effort:
“Defensively we weren’t as sharp as we were against New Jersey and I’m just saying that Houston was very, very good in the second half. They’re hard to score on anyhow. They don’t give you anything in the paint.”
HEAT Forward James Posey
On the game:
“You have to give them a lot of credit. They executed on both ends and got stops when they needed to. They made plays down the stretch. They made some adjustments and executed. We just didn’t do a good job on the defensive end. We didn’t make plays when we had the chance. We just have to come ready to work tomorrow and practice a little bit and correct some of those mistakes.”
HEAT Center Shaquille O'Neal
On the game:
“We just kind of had some lapses in our defense. I think when the game was 70-66, we had a chance to buckle down and tighten up but we had some lapses in our defense. We let T-Mac (Tracy McGrady) get into the lane and he just kicked it out to Luther Head a couple times and Yao Ming hit a couple tough shots. We just need to pick our defense up, especially in the fourth quarter.”
On Yao Ming:
“He’s still pretty much the same. He hit a lot of tough shots tonight and when you’re playing against a guy like that, 7’6”, 7’8”, you’re not going to block his shot. You just got to try and push him out and play him tough.”
HEAT Guard Dwyane Wade
On the game:
“We were a little flat on offense. They did a good job of running their offense. Yao (Ming) hit some tough shots to help give them the lead. They played good.”
“I just couldn’t really get into the flow offensively. I missed shots that I normally hit.”
On Tracy McGrady’s comment that Yao Ming is the best center in the league:
“We know who the best center in the league is.”
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Houston Rockets Head Coach Jeff Van Gundy
On Dwyane Wade:
“Dwyane Wade is hard to guard as anybody in the league. I don’t know if there is a good way to guard him, except try hard.”
On Tracy McGrady:
“Some nights he shoots a lot. Some nights he passes a lot. I am not sure how he sees what he sees. I am just glad he sees what he sees. I can’t see what he sees. That vision is incredible.”
Rockets Forward Shane Battier
On the game:
“We did a good job defensively. We did a good job keeping them out of the lane and keeping them off the free-throw line. If you can do that against a good team you have a better shot of winning.”
On defending Dwyane Wade:
“If I have to do that every night, I’ll be an old man quick. He’s really good. There’s a reason why he is all NBA. He’s tough. He keeps coming at you every single night. The best you can do is just keep chasing him around and putting a hand in his face and hope he misses the next time down the floor.”
Rockets Forward Yao Ming
On defending Shaquille O’Neal:
“It’s a hard job. He’s a dominant center in this league. Between the playoff’s and the regular season last year, he was a totally different Shaq. Obviously, the regular season there is one level. One day I can match up against him.”
On the fourth quarter and the team’s energy:
“That is our mindset. My only chance against Shaq is to keep him on the run. Shaq is much stronger and bigger than me. My only chance on beating him is to keep running and running against him.”
Rockets Forward Tracy McGrady
On the second half of the game:
“That is a sign of a good team. When you struggle offensively in the first half, and you come out in the fourth quarter and you do everything right. We played good defensive. We did all the little things. You go down and you execute on offense. That’s what a great team has to do. Tonight we made a couple strides forward.”