HEAD COACH TERRY STOTTS On Clippers tenacity given injuries: “Well I’m glad you brought that up – I want to congratulate the Clippers and Doc. Obviously the injuries that they had was a setback but they really competed hard. Firstly, I’m very disappointed for Chris Paul and Blake that they weren’t able to be a part of it. Obviously they had championship aspirations and they weren’t playing at full strength, so I really admire what they were able to do. We knew they were going to play hard, we knew they were going to compete and they did, so I’m thrilled with the win but my hat’s off to them.” Is all that matters the win despite not a pretty game? “Hey, 106-103 is beautiful. Look, it was a grind it out game. They have some players who can put the ball in the basket and play off the dribble. Honestly, we lost so many of these type of games early in the season, to keep our composure and make the plays, get a rebound, make some free throws, trust your teammates. It’s not going to be a beautiful 48 minutes. But what I have a problem with is that when you don’t score, it’s considered ugly basketball – when two teams are really competing and playing hard and defending, to me, that’s a thing of beauty as well. So it’s not about always scoring points and shooting a high percentage.” On shooting well from three tonight “Well we did. Mo had it going in the third quarter. I believe in the percentages of the three point shot. If a guy is a 35 percent shooter, it’s going to work its way through. Chief didn’t necessarily shoot the ball well early in the series and he had a couple games for us, same thing with Mo, and Dame and CJ. As long as they’re good shots and open shots and we shoot them with confidence, it’s going to work itself out. That’s part of who we are. We’ve got to take them and believe that you’re going to make them.” On challenge of facing warriors “With a 12:30 game, it’s going to be pretty simple basketball, pretty simple preparation. As the series goes along, both teams will make adjustments. They’ve had some time to think about us. It’s going to be a challenge obviously, but we’ll watch a lot of video tonight and tomorrow, have a meeting tomorrow, and be ready to tip it up on Sunday.” “Our scouting and video, we’re prepared from that standpoint. The coaches, we haven’t put together a game plan or anything like that, all the legwork’s been done, now it’s just a matter of coming up with a game plan.” What do you remember about matchups with Warriors? “I’d love to score 130 again, that would be nice. What stands out is Steph having a quarter, or Klay having a quarter – or somebody – the first game, Brandon Rush and Ian Clark made the difference with their shooting. They’re so balanced and so many different players can hurt you, obviously Klay and Steph are the primary ones, but that’s the challenge. They can put a quick spurt on you at any time and that’s what they kind of do and they did against us in their three wins.”
DAMIAN LILLARD What does it mean to pull out this game the way you did? “I was really proud of what our team did tonight. Obviously they were undermanned but they came out and competed. We talked about what they did in the regular season when they didn’t have guys, going to Utah and winning, competing with OKC. We knew they could come in here and win this game just like we did game five. I was really happy with the way we executed down the stretch. We didn’t panic when they put up a fight for us, we did the things necessary to win the game.” Thoughts on matchup with Warriors: We thought this team was tough without CP and Blake, but that’s a championship team. Even without Steph, they’re still a championship team. We’ve got to keep our mind right, compete and play together. We can’t be worried about who’s not out there because we just watched them beat Houston by 25 twice without Steph. We’ve just got to keep improving on the things we’ve done well and be locked in defensively.” What do you remember about matchups with Warriors? “Just that we were able to score but to beat them, we had to basically outscore them. Against a team like that, if you don’t get stops and you let them get rolling, if we weren’t making shots the way we were, we probably would have lost by 30. We can’t let them be as comfortable as they were that night. They’re going to make shots, we can’t get discouraged by that, but every possession matters when you play a team like that.” What was message to team at the end of the game before walking off the floor? “In the huddle, I just told our guys that we got that done by fighting and being together, pretty much just not worrying about the outside noise whether that’s positive or negative. And then in this series coming up, we’ve got a chance. Everybody will say that we don’t but I just wanted to remind everybody that we’ve got a chance. We’re going to go out there and we’re going to compete and we’re going to put our best foot forward.” How much does it help confidence for other guys playing well? “I think it should really help everybody’s confidence – just because I didn’t shoot great over the course of this series, CJ didn’t shoot great, and a lot of times people think we have our best chance when me and CJ go out there and explode offensively. We had a lot of times where we counted on other guys, and other guys answered the call and stepped up. I think they should feel good about that and they should understand that’s what we need from them. We’re at our best when we can trust each other and continue to count on each other. It happened again tonight. Mason hit three free throws to close out the game. Guys getting offensive rebounds, tipping balls, so that’s what we’ve got to continue to have.”
CJ MCCOLLUM Thoughts on Warriors: “They pose a lot of problems. Historically speaking, they had a really good year breaking the record for wins, losing one game at home I believe this year, so you know it’s going to be a tough environment. Offensively, even without Steph, they do a great job of moving the ball. Draymond is the head of the snake now that Steph’s out, and he moves the ball well. He’s the heart and soul of the team and he gets everybody involved. Klay will be a little bit more aggressive looking to score without Steph and Harrison Barnes and Shaun Livingston and the rest of the guys will be a lot more aggressive too.”
TEAM • With a 4-2 series victory over the Clippers in the First Round of the 2016 NBA Playoffs, the Trail Blazers are advancing to the Western Conference Semifinals for the 11th time in franchise history, and the second time in the past three seasons. • The Trail Blazers are 10-0 in potential best-of-7 series-clinching games at home (most wins in NBA history). • The Trail Blazers are the second team in NBA history to lose their first two games by 20+ points and win a series (Hou. vs. Phx. in 1995). • Portland has now won four straight postseason games in a series for the first time since the 1977 NBA finals vs. Philadelphia. • The Trail Blazers improve to 3-0 at home during the 2016 NBA Playoffs, and are now 79-37 (.681) all-time at the Moda Center during the postseason (40-23 in first round). • The Trail Blazers made 14 three-pointers, setting a new franchise record for the most three-point field goals in a playoff game (13; 4/25/16 vs. LAC, 4/29/15 at MEM). • Portland has now won 12 of its past 13 games at the Moda Center (includes regular season).
PLAYER • Damian Lillard scored a team-high 28 points, marking the eighth time in his postseason career that he has scored at least 25 points. That puts him in a tie with Kike Vandeweghe for fifth-most in franchise history. • Mason Plumlee (14 rebounds) becomes the first Trail Blazer to record at least 10 boards in a playoff series since Bill Walton and Maurice Lucas did so in the 1977 NBA Finals vs. Philadelphia. • Maurice Harkless (14 points) has now matched his season-high of five consecutive games with at least 10 points scored (Feb. 6-21). • Allen Crabbe scored a playoff career-high 13 points, and has now scored 10+ points in each of the past three games. • Maurice Harkless made a career-high four three-point field goals on six attempts (includes regular season).
HEAD COACH DOC RIVERS On the series: “First of all I’d like to congratulate Terry (Stotts) and the Trail Blazers. I thought they played with amazing heart, I thought Terry coached the heck out of his basketball team… Classy organization, and I thought the fans here, like our fans, were absolutely amazing and it was a fun atmosphere to play in. As a coach I’m just so proud of our guys. We had so much stuff thrown at us and the fight, and just the intensity that we played with, from a coaching standpoint just makes you proud.” On Austin Rivers’ game: “It was awesome. He’s bleeding every timeout and it looked like a boxing match for him. He’s a baller. He likes playing basketball and so does our team. I think Paul (Pierce) said that earlier, he said ‘we have a bunch of ballers on this team, guys just like playing,’ and you can see that. It was a neat group of guys to coach.” On when how quickly he needs to start thinking about what’s next for his team: “Oh I never stop thinking about improving the team. I think about it every game, every day, so that doesn’t change for me. Literally every game when I’m coaching I’m watching too. I watch, and read and we’ll be ready.” On what kind of chance he gives the Blazers against Golden State: “I give them a chance, they’re playing great. They’re playing great basketball. They’re other guys have to make shots, obviously. I think where they improved the most is defensively… I thought Terry came in and had an excellent game plan defensively against us. Golden State is wounded a bit, so they have a shot.”
AUSTIN RIVERS On his eye and how it affected his play: “Went up for an offense rebound and I just kind of caught a—I don’t know what it was, I think it was an elbow—I just caught it right to my eye. I can’t really see out of it. It is what it is… Second half, I just tried to be as aggressive as possible. I thought I did a good job. I thought our team did a great job. We just fell short. This one hurts.” On how tough it was to manage the ups and downs of this last week: “It’s been tough…We put so much work in. We really had high hopes. You see your leader go down, then you see your second leader go down, it’s tough, but I thought we did a good job. We stepped up. We were this close to getting to game 7. I don’t really know what to say. We left it all out there.” On the comradery of the team out there: “A lot of people doubted us. A lot of people didn’t think we’d be able to fight. We showed a lot of heart. We went out there and just believed in each other.”
JAMAL CRAWFORD On how this playoff loss compares to those in the past: “This one is a little bit different. I feel like the ones in the past, some of our fears, were kind of self-inflicted, something we kind of brought on ourselves, but you lose your two best players in the same game, you get what you can and you live with the results. I thought we battled. We competed. We gave everything we had tonight. That’s a credit to Doc and a credit to the guys in the locker room.” On Austin Rivers looking up to him and what he advice he gives: “Just to keep his head up. I’ve been so proud of Austin. He probably takes more stuff outside of the locker room than anyone else because obviously his dad being the coach and all that. I’ve never cussed in a press conference, but he played his ass off tonight. He really did. You look at his face, it looks like he was in a boxing match and he came back in and gave us everything he had. I couldn’t be more proud of him and his growth. He’ll continue to get better and better.”
