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NBA WESTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: SUNS v MAVERICKS

June 3, 2006

Mike D'Antoni

PHOENIX, ARIZONA: Game Six

Q. Mike, when you're in a series like this, consecutive years against a team, which a long series, last year, six games, now six games, is there anything that changes, anything more that you learned during it? How do you look at now after playing them and becoming so familiar with them?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: I think it's the same principles. And we just keep -- you know, obviously we have different guys doing those principles, and we understand our tendencies and weaknesses and try to -- being able to relate how our talents now can guard the same thing, but it's the same guy, you know, instead of Raja who is six-four, you have Joe Johnson who is six-eight.
So there's a little difference of what we need to do because of that. But, then again, when you have LB and Raja out there instead of Q, you're faster.
So I think it's just personnel driven than anything. You know what they want to do; they know what we want to do. And we are just trying to match up and take away as much as we can.
Q. I want to ask you about Shawn again. You touched on this in the past, but do you think he's one of the most -- the most unique player in the league, and explain why you think so?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Well, he's unique because he's a 20-10 guy under, you know, I don't know if it's been said but he played with Jason Kidd, Stephon Marbury and Steve Nash, three different point guards, three different systems; didn't change anything. It's amazing to me. It's a stat that's amazing and it attributes to him that -- call plays for him, not call, doesn't matter. He could get more points if we called plays for him, but it will take away from what we can get other guys, because he's going to get his 20 and 10 and he's going to be effective. And I don't think anybody else in the league can do that, that you can completely go away from and average 20 some points. To me that's amazing. And sometimes frustrating for him but, but he has to also understand that's a big part of why we can win.
So, you know, I know that he would love to average 28, which he could if we called plays for him a lot. But for us to win, it's better to help somebody else out.
Then he's the fastest guy. He's also six-seven and one of the best rebounders, which is weird. Never gets hurt, which is weird. Never gets tired, which is weird. You just keep going right down, right down the list. I think sometimes we do take it for granted all the stuff that he can bring to the table, no doubt about it.
Q. Mike, Raja said there was a point in Game 5 where he went to you and said, I don't know how much I have, you can --
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Right.
Q. How was he today and will you monitor his minutes more carefully tonight?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: I think we'll look on the floor and see, you know, what he's doing, obviously if he can't go or he's a little slow or whatever, we'll give him more rest or take him out and try something else. We won't just blindly say, okay, you're not playing well but we don't care.
But also I think he underestimates his value a lot of times. He gets blown by one time, which for him is unheard of, and he gets upset with that one play. But it's the big picture of it, he's still positive for the team.
And I keep telling him that, but that's how it was when he first came here. He'd take a shot that maybe wasn't a great shot and then he wouldn't shoot for a while. We're going, no, Raja, you can make mistakes. You can be -- you're still a positive player, and I think he underestimated his value even in the last game. But he'll be better this game.
Q. Anything this morning that left you more optimistic?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: No. Just human nature he's going to be better, rest and treatments, he'll feel better.
Q. How has the success you've had here in the past two years ranked in your own basketball life and the things that you've done --
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: That's deep.
Q. Yeah, I am deep.
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Geez. (Laughter)
I haven't really thought about it, Paul. I don't know. I mean, it doesn't get any better than this. You know, it doesn't get any better winning championships in Europe and that stuff as a player, but it doesn't -- you know why it doesn't get any better, just the people you're associated with. Our players and staff, it's fun to come to work every day. That's how it was as a player. I've been really blessed with being around unbelievable people.
We've lost games. I've lost, you know, overtime, championship games, I've lost, you know, blown out. But it doesn't affect how you feel about what you're doing at that moment. Because this is an unbelievable job with great people, and I think anything, any line of work that you're in, if you have that type of people around, you know, you know it's the road getting to where you want to go; it's not getting there. You know, it's Christmas Eve. It's the days leading up to Christmas.
Once you open your presents up it's like, oh, God same old stuff. But it's the days coming up to it. And that's what this is. This road is fun. Hopefully it will lead us to a championship and the day after might be disappointing, but getting there is a hell of a lot of fun.
Q. Mike, is it fair to include us, the media, in that group, special people?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Sure is.
Q. Thank you, by the way.
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: You laugh, but it does. You guys have been great.
Q. We are laughing about it.
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Seriously. Sam, I don't know what I'd do without you.
Q. I don't know even know who you are. (Laughter)
Last time I remember loads of questions to you about your team style of play or this can't succeed in the NBA. I don't hear nearly as many of those kind of questions.
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: I think they know -- I'm sorry, go ahead.
Q. I was just going to say a lot of people are saying now you have to play that way, you know, we gotta get small, the rules have changed, have you noticed that?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: It's satisfying to a certain degree but I don't think it's totally. Until we win a championship -- and I'm sure if we get to the Finals for whatever reason they'll be going, you can get to the Finals, you can't win the Finals.
Every step we've gone, you can't do it. We know we can get the Conference Finals twice, and I'm sure there will be articles, if you don't win, you can't win the Conference Finals. Until we win it then, you can't win the Finals and that's okay.
But for the moneys, the way they need to be allocated for the team, for the excitement, for the fans, this is the way we're going to go, and we're excited about it.
And this is -- this is the way it's going to happen for a while until they fire me, which could be any day.
Q. Do you see a grudging acceptance in the rest of the league that may be, hey, we can do --
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: I think some guys will accept some, still will be -- coaches are pretty hard-headed. They're going to do what they feel comfortable. And some will, some won't. That's cool. I don't want everybody to do it. Then we have to figure out to go big. We won't do that.
Q. Mike, obviously 4-0 in elimination games and Game 5 you had the 77-70 lead. Looked like Dirk just completely took the game over. Are you guys going to just sort of let him do his thing like Kobe, and hope he doesn't go huge on you or stop the rest of the team or what's your thought process?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Obviously wasn't good enough last time, my thought process.
I mean there's certain things you can do and certain things you can't do. We're going to try to mix it up on him. We're going to try to -- again, I really think that the reason we got beat, we still held them to 47% shooting which is not bad with Dirk going crazy.
Second chance points and put him on the foul line killed us, and those are the two things we can control. You know, to be honest with you, there are shots that Dirk made that you can't control. That's why he's good. That's why he's an MVP candidate, and that's why he's -- that's why they won.
We can't worry about that. It's like Kobe. You can't worry about things you can't control, but don't put him on the line. Be sure we rotate right, stay under control, make him make hard shots and don't let them get second chance points. That's why we lost. And offensively we broke down a few times. We didn't panic, but we were a little frenetic in our pace. And we can control that and that will be good enough.
Q. Can a team get lured in when a guy coming off a big game -- can a team get lured into keeping an eye on him looking for him too much?
COACH MIKE D'ANTONI: Yes. And we're not going to do that. We're going to do what we need to do to keep them under wraps as much as we can.
But 30 points, 40, we can weather that storm if we do that. Kobe can get 40, 50, 60 on us, and we can do that. Second chance points, foul shots and us playing well, we can weather anybody.

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