Pat Riley
Pat Riley
Patrick James "Pat" Rileyis an American professional basketball executive, and a former coach and player in the National Basketball Association. He has been the team president of the Miami Heat since 1995 and head coach in two separate tenures. Widely regarded as one of the greatest NBA coaches of all time, Riley has served as the head coach of five championship teams, four with the Los Angeles Lakers and one with the Heat...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth20 March 1945
CityRome, NY
CountryUnited States of America
I coached an absolutely awful game; terrible game plan, pick-and-roll schemes; everything.
We're absolutely finding ways to win. We're making play after play we need to make in crucial situations.
He was absolutely great. He did things I haven't seen him do for a couple of years. He's got a lot of energy and he's taking two or three people to the rim. He's picking people apart.
The bigger the moment, both of them stepped up even bigger. Sometimes, it's absolutely beyond description. I haven't seen players do that in a long, long time.
The worst thing that can happen is that this thing goes to seven games and maybe we'll have him absolutely healthy. But we're planning on trying to go up to Chicago and closing this thing out.
They played an absolutely great game. They did what they had to do defensively. It didn't help us that Shaquille got in foul trouble. Any time he gets in foul trouble and has to sit down, it sets us and him back.
People got a view of absolute greatness. It's absolutely beyond description. I haven't seen players do that in a long time.
The guy was absolutely on a torrid pace. We knew that, but we didn't come out and jump on him and shut him down. As a matter of fact, we played him rather passively.
When you play in this league, this league will bring you to your knees very quickly if you're not defending and not respecting the game and we almost got caught. Maybe we'll learn a lesson.
(The players) didn't like last night. It was embarrassing. But that's what you deal with. Once you understand what happened, you've got to get on with making those improvements.
We've got to find a better way to get him the ball deep, and that's going to be my challenge.
The only reason there's a rivalry is because the media has created two icons, very young icons. I don't think there's any kind of rivalry yet. Rivalries are born out of hate. And I don't think players today in this league have a dislike for each other anymore. There's just too much backslapping and hugging and all that stuff.
We will get beat tomorrow night if we bring any of the defensive lapses that we had against Seattle.
When is it going to start? That's the question I posed to them tonight. When are we going to start beating quality teams? It's time to put up or shut up. That's how I look at it.