What They Said! Memphis Grizzlies vs. Milwaukee Bucks Quotes

Pregame Quotes

Grizzlies Head Coach Dave Joerger

“Mike (Conley) will be inactive tonight.”

Day to Day?
“I don’t know. It’s probably just proper to say day to day. I mean no hurry on that one. No other changes on starting lineup.”

On Leuer
“Yeah, he got stiff. Long flight after getting run over by a truck. He’ll try to go tonight.”

Reaction on Rest
“I certainly don’t do it for a short-term response. But for a longer term, hopefully they get their legs to them. I’ve been bringing their minutes back anyways after the break a little bit. Whether we have a back-to-back or take a day off, when we do or don’t have to, you’re hoping to get a response of some energy and some fight. We’ll be looking for that from those four guys.”

On resting
“It was nothing against Washington or TNT or ESPN or NBA league office or John Wall or Kevin Seraphin or whoever else. It’s not about that. It’s about your team, and what you think is best for your team.”

Marc (Gasol)’s Passive Play
“We just try to give him as much space as possible and try to get him aggressive early in the game and in attack mode. I thought earlier in the season he got to the foul line a lot more. Facing up, not waiting and just going. As the season goes on, game preps and the scouting is so much more because there’s such a familiarity and everybody shares information. You can’t sneak anything by.”

“Maybe our spacing is not as good. I don’t think that opponents have any fear whatsoever of anybody we have on the perimeter. There’s like six (defenders) in the lane. It doesn’t matter what guy’s out there, they’re ignoring our perimeter people.”

Post-Game Quotes

Grizzlies Head Coach Dave Joerger

On the game:
“This was a big win for us. I thought we played hard, and our defense holding them to 83 points is tremendous. Our offense was much better tonight and it helped set our defense. We turned the ball over too much. I think we had like nine in the first quarter. We only had two in the second quarter and they really helped get us going. It helped set our defense… They are long and athletic and an attack you with quick-strike offense. We did a nice job of checking off of the glass and only giving them eight offensive rebounds.”

On the distribution of shots defensively:
“I’m hard on Marc (Gasol) because I think Marc is the best center in the game an I think can just absolutely be just a dominant player. I ask him to do a lot and he does a lot for your team. He gets guys in the right spots, he is playing offense and tries to think two and three steps ahead whether he’s rolling to a side with a shooter, should he roll, should he pop, trying to facilitate offense. He does so much for us. He is so valuable and I’m always pushing him to be in attack mode to stay aggressive.”

On feeding off Tony Allen’s energy:
“He wants to win and he will do anything it takes for us to win. We’ve had lots of conversations the last couple of weeks and he’ll just do whatever it takes. Tony did a great job again of getting some fast break points because he gets out and gets his hands on the basketball and gets some deflections. We get some easy buckets with to dunks in the first half. He plays off of Marc (Gasol) and Zach (Randolph) really well and it really seemed like he’s always losing his man because maybe they want to double off on him. He did a nice job of finishing around the rim. He bought the energy up of everybody. I think getting off to the slow start and me making a quick sub kind of jolts everybody, not just the one person that got subbed in or subbed out.”

Grizzlies Guard Tony Allen (9 points, 4 steals, 3 rebounds)

On his mindset for the game:

“I had a lot of energy in me considering the fact I got a surprise sit-down for the Washington game. I definitely wanted to be a part of it. It was a much-needed rest and I took advantage of it. I basically had the mindset coming in today that I have to leave it all out on the court. When I came in I wanted to be an energy, a great deal of energy and I think I showed that today.”

On team’s response to the road trip after losing three of four:
“I thought we had tunnel vision. We weren’t in here crying about it or thinking too much about it. We were just focusing on the next game and having the mindset that we need to get back on track, back to playing for each, playing our defensive coverages the right way, moving the ball, and playing inside out basketball like we normally do. On to the next.”

On preparing for the Denver Nuggets:
“They are a sporadic group. They run up and down. They are pretty talented but like I said, we have to focus on the things that we do and that’s playing hard and playing together. If we can do that for 48 minutes then the sky’s the limit for our ball club.”

Grizzlies Guard Courtney Lee (17 points, 2 assists)

On having more energy for tonight’s game:
“The coach rested some of the guys. I think that was huge for everybody to get days off. People came in here and got treatment. It was good to be back on our home court. Everyone had a chance to regroup and get back on the same page.”

On hitting short jumpers and opening things up:
“That run they went on we were missing a couple of shots. So when those shots went in it gave us a chance to go back and set our defense up.”

On what Marc Gasol said during the huddle:
“He said to come together and focus. We need to continue to execute. Teams are going to go on a run and to stick together. Just keep doing what we’ve been doing.”

On seeing shots go in:
“Seeing shots go in and getting reps up. Coming to the gym until you get that rhythm and you see those shots go down. That’s all it takes. Once you make one you’re on fire.”