Mike Dunleavy Guys Quotations

Our guys played great in overtime along with at the end of regulation to get back into it. We made them miss in overtime and our execution in overtime was tremendous.

I thought our guys came out and gave a good effort defensively tonight. These guys were playing great coming in and to hold them to 36 percent (shooting) is a good thing.

I wasn't pleased with the way we started tonight. I don't know if it was a hangover from the road trip, but in the second half, the guys came out and played much harder and did a good job. We had a hot hand with Elton Brand and we just rode it.

That's what I get for showing our guys a film of how good we were defensively last night (at Houston). We started out good, then we got soft. Our bench came in and was soft. A team that loses eight games in a row is going to come out fighting for their lives. That message was delivered, and we didn't respond.

The part about playing hard, we've got that down pretty good. We play hard every night. No matter how many we get down, guys are resilient and we bounce back. We missed some opportunities down the stretch, as far as being late with some of our execution, but I was really pleased at the way we played. If we play like this every night, it will be a successful trip.

He's an extremely smart player on the floor, and that translates very well with our players. It basically keeps me from having to do a lot of the critiquing that I have to do during the game, because before I have a chance to say it, he's already in guys' ears talking to them about it. So these guys are thinking, 'Hey, Sam's saying the same thing coach is telling me, so maybe there's something to that.' So it's a real positive.

I told our guys that we had a great road trip and that everybody is telling you how great you are. The reality is, we have 35 games left and we have to take care of business. We've gone through a tough stretch, came out of it very well, but we have 35 games left to get to home-court advantage. We've got 35 games left to catch Phoenix. There are all kinds of things out there left for us to do. Right now, our goal shouldn't be to make the playoffs. Our goal should be to get home-court advantage.