Jerry Sloan People Quotations

Nelson did a great job keeping us off balance. I thought his play was terrific. He's strong ... he can score, he was able to get people the basketball and help them get the kinds of shots they wanted. That's one of the big things that hurt us.

None of this has any bearing on who will start the season. I told them that today. I've got to move a lot of people around. I've got to see how different guys play off the bench, see how they play with other people.

We only had about three or four possessions where we got up and played people. That was the only life we had. Somewhere along the line we need to defend people so we can compete.

People think it's pretty easy, but it's pretty difficult. A year ago, this team just kept going farther and farther down. They didn't step up and try to make a change. We were 11-21, I think, a year ago and the next game didn't matter probably.

They know what they're doing defensively. They pushed us around and didn't let us do anything. When people put pressure on us, it seems like we just don't believe in an offense.

I never like for anybody to miss a game. I think that if you're going to play, you play the best. I've never been one of those people who hopes a guy doesn't play, because I'd rather compete against him. And if you're not good enough, then you don't belong here, anyway.

Andrei was terrific in helping our people (defensively). He had seven blocked shots which was really life saving coming down the stretch because their momentum picked up there at the end.

Andrei makes a huge, huge difference when he's out there, but we can't rely on him to take care of all of our mistakes. I thought our other people did a good job.