<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post"><div align="center">Van Gundy and his veterans will teach the Riley method to Heat newcomers</div> The veteran players, guys who have been on the Heat two years or more, know there is one certainty about their team, and that is that everything will start with hard-nosed, Pat Riley-influenced defense. The challenge facing coach Stan Van Gundy when camp opens Tuesday is that he has only three such players: guard Eddie Jones (four years) and forwards Rasual Butler and Malik Allen (two years apiece). Sure, second-year guard Dwyane Wade and second-year forward Udonis Haslem were with the Heat last season and adapted to the rugged defensive style. But those who played two years ago under Riley, the former Heat coach and current team president, are better versed in the defensive system employed by Van Gundy, Riley's longtime assistant. "I think more so than any other year we've been here our attention early on in training camp will shift to the defense," Van Gundy said of the Heat, which added several shooters in the off-season. "We have guys coming from different defensive philosophies playing for us. We have to get guys on the same page and thinking our way defensively. Defensively we've got a lot of work to do and things we've got to get better at." Miami's defense this year probably won't resemble the gritty unit of past years that was anchored by center Alonzo Mourning and included stoppers such as P.J. Brown, Dan Majerle, Keith Askins and Bruce Bowen. This year's Heat, of course, will be anchored by center Shaquille O'Neal, who is slimmed down and perhaps more agile than he has been in years. But at the forwards, the Heat has some molding to do. Christian Laettner, Michael Doleac (who also will play center) and Wesley Person aren't known for their defense. Even Butler is defensively challenged. "We have some guys who have looked at themselves as offensive players and haven't taken the defensive responsibility we need them to take," Van Gundy said. It's somewhat of a comfort to Van Gundy knowing that last year he taught first-year players such as Wade, Lamar Odom and Rafer Alston the Heat's way of defense. Miami ended the season eighth in points allowed at 89.7 points per game. Odom and Alston are gone, but Jones said even now, as the Heat veterans play pickup games, the holdovers are trying to teach the newcomers. "We go through it every day, telling guys, 'Do this, do that. This is where we've got to get,' " Jones said. "In our defense, if guys learn it it'll be just like last year. The game on offense became easy because we were creating turnovers and we played off that. Once guys really bought into it we started playing good basketball."</div><div align="center">Source</div> Although defense is our number one concern Pat Riley/Van Gundy teams all focus on D and take it seriously. You guys remember how well we played against the Pacers in the playoffs? I remember the only thing ever keeping us in the game was our defense because our offense had like 4 min scoring droughts in every game against the Pacers (thank god those days our over ). C-Shaq - Man, if they force Shaq to play hard defense this year... PF-Haslem - Udonis is always bustin his a$$ and although he's capable of scoring he earns his minutes by rebounding and playing good defense. He's expected to do great this year. SF-Person - He's probably the weakest link in the starting lineup. Especially considering the East is loaded with SFs. We'll see how he improves after training camp. SG-E Jones - Jones knows how Riley stresses defense. He seems to have lost a step but is still good enough. He's good enough that he might be put to start at SF at times to play against Tayshaun Prince and Ron Artest. PG-Wade - Wade's shown signs of real great D although he's been inconsistant. This years olympics gave us something to really look forward to as far as defense goes: He led the team with 17 Steals. Who was #2? Lamar Odom with 16. Miami's boyz had the best defense outta all the stars. Players also had a tougher time scoring against Wade. He also had 3 blocks and tipped the ball away from the defense outta bounce or to his team that caused fast breaks.
