Mike Thibault
Mike Thibault
Mike Francis Thibaultis an American basketball head coach, formerly of the Connecticut Sun of the WNBA, and now of that league's Washington Mystics...
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Jim's NBA career was all about determination. No one studied the game more. He had notebooks on every single player he ever faced. I bet he still has them.
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We were sitting in the Seattle locker room after we lost, ... and we knew that with two more wins, we would have had the game on our court. I think it was an eye-opener. They had been content just to be OK but it was clear to them how important the home court was. They found out what it meant during the finals.
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I guess I'm not much of a prognosticator, because I thought we would play our best game of the series today, and we played our worst. They're disruptive (defensively), but by this point in the series, we should be able to better handle it.
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I guess I'm not a very good prognosticator, because I thought we would play our best game of the series (Sunday) and we played our worst,
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It was pretty even most of the way, ... but the difference for me is obvious: turnovers. We had control of the game for a while and we gave it back.
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It was a very rugged basketball game for long stretches. Bodies flying everywhere ... a lot of fouls ... but we kept our poise at the end. We played good enough defensively at the end of the game to win.
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It's a huge road win, guarantees a winning road record for us. Every time you win a road game at this point in the season, it puts pressure on the teams trying to catch you to do the same.
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It's a great win, when you go on the road and win your first playoff game and play pretty well like we did. That was as good a first half as you could play to open a playoff series and then we lost our composure in the second half and got it back and I just thought we played terrific.
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It is a great experience. The two teams I coached on the men's side were some of the most exciting moments in my coaching life. Obviously winning NBA Championships and CBA Championships and being in the WNBA Finals are all highlights. But playing and coaching for your country in a gold medal game is pretty intense.
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That?s why you keep three point guards on most teams, so if you have this situation you?re not in real trouble. We?re prepared for these kinds of things. We didn?t prepare for it to be in the first game of the Finals. But it happens, so we?ll just try to deal with it and hope something good happens.
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I thought we'd play our best game (Sunday) - instead we played our worst. (Afterward in the locker room), I just wrote the stats on the board and let them stare at them awhile.
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The fact that we were in the finals two years in a row is a great thing, ... We put ourselves in a tough position in this series losing Game 1 (69-65 at Mohegan Sun on Sept. 14). I think we're every bit as talented as Sacramento. But they made their breaks for themselves tonight. ... We have been here twice and now we have to figure out a way to get over the hump.
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The fact that we're in the Finals two years in a row is a great thing, ... We put ourselves in a tough position in this series losing Game 1. I think we're every bit as talented as Sacramento. But they made their breaks for themselves tonight.
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I like the finals format but I don't like the first two rounds. It's never going to be perfect until we get a best-of-five of the first round and get to play our first game at home. Historically, other than a few upsets over the years, the better teams have still won. But it's not a great scenario to go on the road your first playoff game.