Maurice Cheeks Basketball Quotations

We want him to get offensive opportunities - no question. I think that he can get more opportunities in running the floor, getting early post up which he did. Tonight was a little unusual where he had more than a number of attempts at dunking the basketball going to the rim so I think that's a little bit unusual.

We need one. We're entitled to one, I think. We've been going down to the wire a lot of games. Sometimes it feels good for the players and myself to play a game where you don't have to worry about somebody getting an offensive rebound or making a last-second shot to win a basketball game. For us, we needed that.

When you have a bad season, everything is possible. As a team we failed. It certainly wasn't what I hoped or wanted, but that's the way life is sometimes. I'm going to try to make myself better and this basketball team better.

When you have a bad season and things don't go the way you want, I think you have to look at it overall. All things are possible when you fail. As a team, we failed. We didn't accomplish what we looked to do. When those things happen you have to look and see if you make changes. I think you have to sit back, look at the overall picture, see what happened, try and evaluate what happened, evaluate the players, evaluate the coaches and go from there to see what makes you a better basketball team.

We all think that Andre is this veteran player, because he has played so many games in his first two seasons. We take for granted that he should be at another level, but he has to grow a little more.

When it got to a certain point I think the fatigue factor went out the window, because everyone was playing on adrenaline. I know that Chris was exhausted.

Coming into a building like this, playing a very good basketball team like this, you know if you get up 20 points they're going to make a run. They had a chance at the end. But our attention to detail was big, from the first minute of the game to the last minute.

First of all, New Jersey is a very good basketball team. We're working our way back. We started out good and they started making some shots. Vince (Carter) made some shots and our defense still has to get better.

No, we lost four of five games and it didn't matter who it was. We had to win a basketball game and it so happened to be against Portland.

That game was a prime example of a team effort and a team really trying not to lose a basketball game.

It's something we talked about in this new season; to do different things in terms of being a leader out on the floor. That means sharing the basketball and taking over the game when he has to. These three games, he has been phenomenal.

I knew Randy would be on someone's bench because he's a very good basketball coach. That's not a secret.

He can dunk the basketball. You have to be a little creative out there. I think he'll do fine.

Allen has been playing some great basketball for us and Chris is playing like he did a few seasons ago. We need to keep picking up wins if we're going to be a playoff team.