Avery Johnson
Avery Johnson
Avery Johnsonis an American basketball coach who is currently the head coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide men's basketball team. Johnson spent 16 years in the National Basketball Association as a player, and subsequently served as the head coach of two NBA teams: the Dallas Mavericks and New Jersey/Brooklyn Nets. He led the Mavericks to their first NBA Finals appearance and to three consecutive 50+ win seasons. During his playing days, Johnson was known as the "Little General" for his...
ProfessionBasketball Player
Date of Birth25 March 1969
CityNew Orleans, LA
There is going to come a time here - I don't know when - when we're going to start getting some guys back. And it's going to be very important that those guys get back on the practice court and things will get back to normal. But now isn't the time.
We're on the radar now. There is no hiding.
When he's on his game and he's playing tough, hard-nosed defense and getting rebounds, getting some assists, guarding one of the better perimeter players and scoring, I'm a much better coach.
We thought we were pretty good defensively, for the most part, against one of the tougher teams in the Western Conference. We knew we had to be physical.
We thought we had it won in regulation. Carmelo made a tough shot. If we had to do it all over again, we probably would have fouled.
We thought we had a legitimate beef with the way they were playing Dirk. When you don't complain, sometimes it can give the message that you don't care.
We thought we got our defense under us in the first half and kind of set the tone for the rest of the game. We had a little lull defensively in the third quarter, but they're a very good offensive basketball team and they weren't going to come out of the locker room lying down.
We are fortunate to get out of here with a victory. Both teams played some really awesome defense and we just couldn't get our offense in gear in the second half. This is another game that we proved to ourselves that we can win basketball games with our defense. I don't know if we would have won this game in the past. Now we are a different team.
What we have here is a failure to communicate.
He's a scoring point guard. I want him to make the right pass at the right time and lead. But we need 18 points, too. No pressure. We just need him to be what he was in the playoffs.
He's definitely the best point guard in the history of the Spurs franchise.
He's giving us the big drives when we need them and the big assists. He draws a lot of attention. On nights when his offense is not there, we need him to be a ball mover.
He's doing some light shooting, moving around better, a lot of pool work. He's looking good. It's just a matter of when we can get him back out on the practice court and him having the confidence to shift, cut, push off. He had a pretty bad sprain, but he's doing really well. He's ahead of schedule.
Hopefully the next game. I'm hoping that if this were a playoff game, he'd be playing.