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
We had a great fourth quarter defensively. We did not get into foul trouble early and made some really big defensive plays. They shot the ball extremely well tonight. We were down going into the fourth quarter and really raised the level of our defense.
I hated to break up the energy level we had going early in the fourth quarter.
That's one of the better, more complete games that we've played in a long time. It's the first time that Shaq, in a couple of weeks, has been running to the rim and we got him early in transition and that's what it was. We have to get back to that game.
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.
We kept trying to call his number. We had him handle the ball a lot and he was either getting to the line or getting some hoops.
We kept coming back, coming back. And every time we came out of a huddle, they sort of regained their composure again.
This trip reminds me of when I started. You've got to get after it.
To say they came ready to play is an understatement. They came out and really wanted to make a statement. They jumped (on the Cavaliers) defensively and created most of their offense off their defense.
We got it done at both ends of the court in that fourth quarter. That's the type of effort we need night in and night out.