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NBA SEASON GAME: HEAT v CELTICS

October 26, 2010

Doc Rivers

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS

HEAT Â– 80
CELTICS Â– 88

Q. Talk about the defense played tonight.
DOC RIVERS: Yeah, our defense was terrific all night. We broke one rule consistently on defense tonight. After the game they all yelled it out when I came in, corner threes. We never give up corner threes, and I think they had four or five of them in one stretch. Other than that, I thought for the most part we tried to make them play against five. That was what we were saying going into the game, and keep them out of transition. The turnovers were too high. You know, it didn't hurt us as much in the second half, but they still hurt us, and that's what kept them in the game.
But I just loved their defense. I felt we lost our pace, completely off in the second half. The first half we were running, pushing the ball up, had ball movement, getting early in our offense. I know the second half we tried to just slow the game down, and I don't want to play at that pace.

Q. (No microphone.)
DOC RIVERS: Yeah, and getting them out of the paint. Listen, they're going to be great, too. I told our guys at halftime I knew their defense was going to be good but they missed some shots, too. I told them at halftime I was not happy defensively because they did not have a lot of points, but I thought they had good looks, and we can't play on luck. We want to be a great defensive team.

Q. What were you guys missing in the third quarter?
DOC RIVERS: I thought it started before he went out obviously, and again, it was our pace. I felt we were looking for things, and I agree with some of the things we were looking for, but I thought we were taking too long. We were trying to exploit match-ups, instead of running our offense and moving the ball. I felt we got away from it, and then they started scoring and then the game got tight.

Q. (Inaudible.)
DOC RIVERS: Right now, and I said this before the game, with him he's the fifth guy a lot because he knows a lot of our stuff. Rondo ran three plays in the fourth quarter that we literally hadn't run this year in a practice or anything, and a lot of those, we scored three on one, so it allowed us to keep playing. And Shaq will gradually get there but we've got to make sure we milk Baby and tell him.

Q. On Dwyane Wade's play:
DOC RIVERS: Oh, he'll be so much better. I don't know if he's healthy or not. He did look explosive down the stretch, but you don't miss as much as you miss with him and have rhythm. And he could see his rhythm. I thought as the game went on, he got better. No, he'll be much better. Hopefully we will, too.

Q. Paul looked like he was in a little bit of pain in his back. This is something you've obviously seen before. Is this just Paul being Paul?
DOC RIVERS: What are you trying to say there? I don't know. Actually when he hit the floor, you could see he hit it pretty hard. I thought he was out, honestly, even when he came back. I asked him if he wanted to go back in when he walked on, and he really didn't answer. So I actually thought he was out. He came back, he was great. He was terrific. That's huge. I don't know if we win if he doesn't come back.

Q. Can you just talk about Ray's three.
DOC RIVERS: Yeah, we drew a play out of the time-out, and the only thing we said is if it's not there, it won't be there because they have to rotate, and if they rotate, if we make the next pass, the ball will find the open guy. And that was terrific. He had a shot, but it would have been contested, and he made the extra pass.
We always talk about no hero ball, and to me that was a hero pass in a great way. He didn't have to make that pass, but he made the right decision, and it was great.

Q. Rondo had more assists than you had as a team. Can you talk about the impact he had on the game.
DOC RIVERS: Well, there wasn't a lot of points, so there wasn't a lot of assists. But Rondo was just -- I thought he was spectacular. The one thing I didn't like in this game, and you're going to have these games every once in a while, we played too many minutes with some of our guys. We knew that going into the game, and for the first ten with Delonte we're going to have to stretch minutes a little bit, but that's not something I want to get used to.

Q. Now that it's over was it as big --
DOC RIVERS: It was a big game. It was a fun game. We play Cleveland tomorrow. But it was a fun game. They're going to be a lot better when we see them again, and hopefully we are, as well. Thanks, guys.

End of FastScripts

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