Flip Saunders Ben Quotations

When Ben struggles, sometimes that motivates him at the defensive end. He gets the attitude that if I'm not going to score, then you aren't going to score.

Ben usually makes big free throws down the stretch and when he misses, it motivates him to play harder defensively.

Ben played 56 minutes last night (in Memphis), and he played 41 tonight. Yet, he was able to do what he did. When we needed to lock down in the final two minutes, he pretty much did it.

Ben is our energy. I would be amazed if he wasn't the defensive player of the year again just from everything he does. He's our lock-down guy. When we have energy, we are tough to beat and tough to score on. When we don't, we can be pretty ordinary. And Ben is usually the catalyst for that energy.

Ben erases a lot of mistakes for us. He was unbelievable with everything he was doing.

Ben did as good a job as you can on Shaq when you play him one-on-one. His defensive presence gave us the ability to shut down some of their other people.

Ben works on it a lot, ... We do a lot of shooting as a team, 15-, 17-foot shooting, which is basically free throws. We shoot probably 100 of those a day. So he's getting a lot more free throws.

Ben was phenomenal. People talk about Bruce Bowen and others as the best defender. Bruce is a great individual defender. Ben is a great individual defender. But Ben Wallace might be one of the best that's played the game as a team defender.

Ben was phenomenal defensively. It was good that we were able to get Ben some good extended rest. He's going to be bench-pressing a lot of weight on Wednesday.

Ben was great. The energy he played with for 56 minutes was unreal.

Ben was great. He showed tonight why I keep saying he's the best defensive player in our league.

There's no question that Ben has been as dominating as a center in what he does as anybody in the league. I told him he's kind of like a middle linebacker in football. He patrols that middle and goes from an aggressive standpoint.

They're kind of like my family, with Debbie and the kids being here (in Minnesota). I was talking to Ben Wallace and I was telling him, 'You guys are what I have.

I told Ben when I talked to him that I have a lot of respect for him and everything he does.

I told Ben after, I had been in the Western Conference for a lot of years and I have coached against Dirk many times. I don't think I had seen as good a job of playing a guy one-on-one as that. Dirk made some shots, but he really had to work. We wanted to make him a volume scorer, and 25 points on 23 shots, that's pretty good.

I looked back at that. What always seems to happen is, the guys will play well, and they'll have one stinker game that week. They'll have one game where Chauncey might have 11 points, six assists. Or Ben might get nine rebounds instead of 18. Rip might have 13 points instead of 23. And in this league so much, it goes down to statistics.

He's the barometer for their team. He is the heart and soul of their team. He can play three positions (shooting guard and both forward spots), and he works so hard. He is kind of like their Ben. Ben is our energy guy, and Shane is theirs.