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NBA WESTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: SUNS v LAKERS


May 24, 2010


Derek Fisher


PHOENIX, ARIZONA: Practice Day

DEREK FISHER: Definitely would have felt better. But definitely don't feel like it was erased. You need everybody making as much of a contribution as they can and tomorrow night it might be somebody else.
But we'll figure it out.

Q. Maybe Andrew Bynum may not play tomorrow night?
DEREK FISHER: I don't know. I mean, I mean, it's a team. So I guess had we won the game, maybe it would be different. Know what I mean? So I'm not really in the business of singling out guys and saying he is the reason we did or didn't. So I'm not so caught up in Andrew not playing and that being a better thing for us. I think Andrew is an important part of our team.

Q. Is it just a matter of knocking down the looks that you get against the zone in order to kind of destruct that approach on defense if they had been successful?
DEREK FISHER: In some ways. You know, you definitely have to make shots when teams play on defense. But you can't, I guess, take and settle for the shots that they want you to take and settle for.
You have to still put yourself in a position where you're creating your shots that you want to take. In the zone, sometimes that's tough to do, because they actually are easy shots to take early in the clock, sometimes 3-pointers. But that second half we didn't, we never found a way to really effectively use Pau in the post. That was a big problem.

Q. Derek, for the average NBA fan, in the course of 82 games, how often does a team play zone, the average team?
DEREK FISHER: In a 48-minute game, there might be a six-minute stretch total. When you think about 24-second shot clock, it might be six minutes total in the game where a team might play a zone.
So seeing it for three quarters or for a whole half is definitely unique. But, you know, when it's effective, you are going to definitely continue to see it. And I think the reason why teams don't always stick with it is because it's not effective over time.
And they were able to be effective with it over time last night. And that's something that you don't normally see.

Q. So on the flip side, like you were just telling him, one of the ways to nip it in the bud and make it ineffective fast?
DEREK FISHER: Well, we just have to be sharper in our decision-making and our execution on offense and understand what they're trying to accomplish by playing the zone. They're obviously trying to stop penetration, stop easy entries into the post.
But that doesn't mean you just settle for what they're giving you. You can still create opportunities. You can still get the ball inside and just takes a little bit more work. But that's what today's about. It's about adjustments and doing some things better so that we can come back and give ourselves a chance to win tomorrow.

End of FastScripts




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