Keyon Dooling Quotations

One of the good things about the NBA is that if you don't have a good game one night, you can come back the next night and get a win against a team like Boston. We were supposed to beat Atlanta, and we had to come back and get this one.

One of the best teams in the league came in here and everybody probably wrote us off. But we took care of business tonight.

If we would've taken care of business early in the season we wouldn't be in this position. Our team was a little different then.

For us, we've got to treat these final 20-some games like they're our playoffs. We haven't thrown in the towel. You can question our execution, but not our effort. Things didn't go the way we wanted this season, but you can use this time to get ready for next year.

Basketball is an emotional game. Sometimes you don't think, you just react and tonight was one of those nights.

He's a guy that you have to play big against. Everybody in the West was trying to compete with the Lakers, because they were the dynasty. But now, you see a more free-flowing offense out there.

He was like a community father. He was more than a serious role model for us young cats.

We just have to get better offensively. It's definitely frustrating. We have a game plan, a job to execute it and for whatever reason, it doesn't happen.

Our guys are too competitive to throw in the towel now. It's way too early to talk about us packing it in. Miami came back two years ago and New Jersey did it last year, so we just need to get on a roll.

I think everybody's getting a good look at the future with this team.

I wish I had the remedy for this. Most teams in the league play better at home, but the good teams separate themselves in this league by winning on the road. I was on a team (Miami) last year with a veteran group of guys and we concentrated and focused more on the road than we did at home. We're a young team and we've still got a lot to learn.

I think he was the most important guy who got caught up in the trade deals.

You can call it shaky. I call it poise . . . . And the thing is, we don't know who's going to do it. Everybody's making plays down the stretch.

You have to defend your home court if you want to be a playoff team.

We need to take this momentum and roll it over like cell-phone minutes next season.

We're building chemistry every day, and we're really figuring out how to play with one another. What we're doing now is just going to be a great stepping stone to the future for us.

You lose games in the NBA. That's the bottom line. Sometimes you're going to lose games you win on paper. They're getting ready for the playoffs. They're hitting their stride. I think they'll be all right.

When you're playing a good team like that, you've got to take care of the basketball.

Elton Brand is having a MVP-type season. He's their guy. They went to him and he delivered.

Elton is having an MVP-type season. He's their guy. They went to him and he delivered.

Everybody wrote us off. It's nice to keep proving people wrong.

It was tough. Defensively, we didn't contain Wade or Shaq.

You get in the heat of the battle and sometimes situations aren't handled the way they should be. I think that was an example of that tonight.

There are going to be nights where he just totally dominates the glass. He has the potential to do that. He has the talent to do that. He has the work ethic to do it.

If you ask around the league, people will say we are good guys. It was just a mistake on both our parts. I wish I could take it back.

It's gratifying for all of us because you just don't know who is going to do it from night to night. At any given time anybody on this team can make a play to win the game for us.

I just feel like if we do our job and take care of what we have to take care of, everything else will work itself out. We dug ourselves so deep a hole in the beginning of the season, it's going to be tough for us to get in. But nevertheless, there still is a chance.

Chemistry is probably the most underrated thing in basketball. When you have good chemistry, your team usually goes out and executes on both ends of the floor.

I pretty much knew I'd be tired after the first two minutes. You can call me a prophet, because I was. But it was just fun. My adrenaline was running. Once the lights come on and the popcorn starts popping, I just love it.

Good teams are going to make runs at us, but we just had to stay focused. It's gratifying because we stepped up and collectively got it done.

It was a basketball fight, that's all it was. There really isn't anything else to say.

Sometimes you don't think, you just react. I wish I could take it back.

Sometimes you don't think, you just react. I wish I could take it back. I feel bad for the fans that participated in it and for the kids that had to see it.

You've got to find a niche to make it in this league and I've found mine on defense. Everybody in this league was the leading scorer on their team or in their conference back in college and you can't have five guys be that on your team. Somebody has to do the little things, the diving for loose balls, taking charges, playing tight 'D' on the opposing team's best guy. That's what I do. That's what I bring to this team.

Along with A.I. (Allen Iverson) and Tony Parker, he's probably the fastest guy in the league with the ball.

The challenge for us is to close this season out on a positive note and carry into next season. We've got a very young team and hopefully we can just keep everybody together because I think everybody has accepted their roles.

It's a long shot to think we can win the next nine. It's not like we had the button turned off all year, and we just clicked it on. But we've got young guys growing up quickly. Anything is possible.

It's tough right now with a lot of bodies down, and a lot of guys have to play a lot of minutes.

There was no trash-talking going on. I don't know if he was frustrated with a couple of missed calls or something like that. That's not what I was out there doing. I was just playing basketball.

It seems like sometimes we get a little stagnant and pound the ball too much, and that's mainly my fault and Steve's (Francis) fault. Offensively, we've just got to get better.

We got stops in overtime when we needed them. Iverson is so tough to stop and you're never really going to stop him. We tried to make him take tough shots and make them take tough shots. It's a big win for us. To come on the road and keep this winning streak is great. It's very satisfying to get this win after working like we did tonight.

It's a different team. We've made a conscious effort to get the ball moving. When you get the ball moving, it's more fun and you get better shots instead of just going one-on-five sometimes.

They have like an unspoken language when they're playing together. They're a great team, a championship team, the best team in the league.