Richard Hamilton
Richard Hamilton
Known as "Rip," he was an NBA shooting guard with a deadly 15-foot jump shot. He helped lead the Detroit Pistons to an NBA Championship in 2004.
ProfessionBasketball Player
Date of Birth14 February 1978
CityCoatesville, PA
best couple felt guess last lost minutes records switched
I was surprised. They just lost (Game 7 to the Pistons) in the last couple of minutes and they had one of the best records in the NBA, then they switched everything up. I guess they felt they had to get better.
afford awareness ball chance gives record seemed slept speaks time
We kind of slept on them down there. We can't afford to do that this time around; their record speaks for itself. We didn't have a chance down there. Once the ball went up, it seemed like we were down by 10 or 15 points. That just gives us more motivation, more awareness that we can't come out lackadaisical.
anybody beat chance concerned record teams thinking trying win
Not at all. We can only be concerned with ourselves. We are just trying to win every game. We aren't thinking about anybody else's record but our own. All you can do when you have a chance to play these teams is to beat them.
best game last lost mean record since time waiting
All that other stuff, best record and all of that, doesn't mean anything. This is the time we've been waiting for since we lost the last game last year.
satisfied
We just never like to be satisfied being satisfied. Every game, we've got to play hungry.
games great guys job pulling win
We just want to keep it going, ... Guys here are very energetic. Everybody's pulling for each other. We want to win as many games as possible, and we did a great job tonight.
advantage bulls chicago court focused great home stay throughout win
We just want to come out and stay focused and try to win each game. I mean, it's a great streak. But to us, it's a game. We don't look at what the Chicago Bulls did or anything like that. We just want to get home court advantage throughout the playoffs.
gas great job
We just wanted to put on the gas when we got a lead. We did a great job with that.
kept key needed stops stuck
We just stuck with it. We kept playing, and then we made the key stops we needed down the stretch.
coach win
It was very calm, ... Coach said, 'We still got a lot of time. We're still going to win this game.'
chance felt forget gave relief smiled stepped until
It was weird. I really felt a sense of relief when I stepped on that floor. It gave me a chance to forget about everything that was going on off the court. I hadn't smiled all day until I got on that court.
game playing
I've been playing this game too long to know what that is.
fans games guys locker mean media talk types winning
Things like that, that's more for the fans and for you all media types to write about and talk about. The guys in that locker room, and I mean this, we don't talk about things like that. ... We talk about winning games and what we need to do to win games.
definitely felt fun
Everything was just like I thought it would be. It was fun and it was exciting. If I didn't have the jitters then it wouldn't have felt right. I definitely had the jitters.