Stan Gundy Quotations

We believe we're going to be in the next series, too.

We'll see if we can make some adjustments, but we're certainly not going to panic.

Shooting under 50 percent for NBA players is absurd. Getting to the line becomes a negative for us.

Shaquille obviously looked rusty offensively. But he looked very good on the defensive glass, and he was more active defensively than he was for big parts of last year.

one of his best practices ... since he's been here.

Now we're finally in a position to build a core. And now our job as both coaches and players is to fit the pieces together and figure out how we're going to make it work.

Obviously, it gets three of our guys out there who have a better idea of what we're doing.

I don't even know what I was thinking. Obviously I wasn't in my right mind.

I'd love it, because I think we've got the guy in the league that more people flop on than anybody,

I expect Shaq will be the most dominant force in the NBA. I've got a little bit of history to back that up.

I expect those two guys to play at even a higher level, because I think we've got some guys that can also make the game a little easier for them.

I emerged from summer league feeling that I would have no trouble, no problem playing Wayne Simien. And I think that's the first step for any player. ... I think he has the skills and the smarts and the toughness where you would have no problem.

He will be a very difficult guy to cut.

The people out there with the 'too many stars, not enough basketballs, too many egos,' that's wrong,

He's a guy that if you tell me, 'You've got an injury or whatever and you've got to play Wayne 24 minutes a game,' I'm fine with that.

He seemed like he was in some pain and obviously disappointed because he wants to play.

He's a very, very good passer and he can shoot the ball. He needs to knock down perimeter shots for us consistently. That's obviously something that we're looking for right now.

I thought we sucked it up and played very, very hard. ... That has to be the model for us in terms of how to finish the game.

I thought guys were trying to make good plays but our spacing was really fouled up.

I thought that our offense was horrible the entire night. We've got to find some other ways to score besides throwing the ball to Shaq.

I thought our defense was horrible the entire night. Besides throw the ball to Shaq, we've got to find other ways to score.

I was writing the league. I wish they'd get tougher on it. From what they're saying, they're working on not getting fooled on the flop.

I saw your face on the sticks on Pardon the Interruption . That's big.

Our system is a little different than what some of (the new players) are used to, and what we're asking them to have an emphasis on is a little bit different than what they're used to. But they're working hard at it.

Standing pat was not the best thing to do. It doesn't mean that you're saying last year's team couldn't win it. What it means is, you think there might be a better way to go.

We need some guys who make it work. Sometimes you just need guys to catch the ball and move the ball and get out of the way and create spacing and things like that. I haven't seen a lot of that so far, of guys really willing to do that.

You can dunk on him five times and he's going to be back there again the next time.

When you're talking about roles, there could be offensive roles, ... but a guy can't decide that defense is not part of his role.

We had four or five three-on-two fast breaks where all three guys were running next to each other. We were in general not wide enough.

Those are the two biggest things, run and make open shots.

To be doing all of this with what he's gone through physically, I'll never get over it. It's phenomenal.

The expectation question is a little bit overdone. I think I've got it figured out. If the expectations for your team are high, and you don't measure up, you get fired. If the expectations are low and you lose, you get fired.

We don't care if it's a young guy or old guy, we are looking for the group who is the best fit. But these veteran guys are smart, tough, they have experience.

We've got very good young guys. I've said this for 10 years, and it's certainly true again this year, maybe more so than in a lot of years. Our scouting staff, they've done an unbelievable job uncovering good young players.

Tony Parker, if you've been watching this year, has just been picking people apart on the pick-and-rolls. We made it a major emphasis and made a decent effort. ... It was tough to contain him tonight.

We got some good energy, and I thought we moved the ball a lot better at the start of the second half and we got out in transition. Antoine had a good run at the defensive end a little bit that got us out into transition.

There's no question in my mind that they have the best understanding of what their game is.

Defensively he's not there yet because he's still got a ways to go conditioning-wise, ... but he's a very good defender.

That team, to me, on paper, is a 55-win team. I think they've got a great nucleus there.

You never want one of your best players to go down with an injury, but it's also a part of the game.

You never want one of your best players going down with an injury. It's all also part of the game. We're already dealing with three veteran guys out, now a fourth veteran guy out, so some of these young guys are going to have to step up and play.

This is hopefully rock bottom. Everybody's trying to go one-on-one.

They do a great job at the basket. They're a team that doesn't give up points in the paint, and it's tough to get anything to the rim, and we didn't have a lot of guys making (outside) shots.

There were a lot of good things tonight. More than anything I really liked our energy and our intensity.

It was a really hard fought game. We finished the game very well. That has to be the model for how to finish the game...Hopefully, we can build on this game.

I told him I thought he already had the best guy.

I told them all of you guys are wrong.

It's going to be a harder road for 82 games - a lot more teams competing for it. And you're going to have to be a lot better when it counts in April and May to get to where we want to go.

It's hard to judge anything on one night. But it wasn't a positive.

It's a very difficult situation. How we'll handle it with him, I don't know.

That's sort of a day-to-day thing. The idea last night was not to overly fatigue him in one stretch, and also not sit him out for too long where he tightened up.

It'll get better as we go, but it's going to require a focus from a lot of people.

It's great to be able to do something for people.

It's very hard to call a flop, ... We talked about it with Bennett. You can't say a guy's flopping, so go penalize it. It's very difficult to make that determination.

They are going to have to beat out those veteran guys. It is not going to be easy. At every spot there are good veteran people ahead of them.

They wanted to win a lot more than we did. They had a lot more resolve to try to get the job done down the stretch and we were hoping we would win, we were hoping some shots went in but we didn't dig down and make any possession tough on them at the end.

It was just a very good win. We need everything we can get right now.

It's not about numbers. Then you'd have guys fighting. It's about playing the game better. It's being more efficient, it's making better decisions, it's playing the other end of the floor better and it's lifting your team to heights they haven't been to.

It's related to his confidence more than anything. He's going to have to fight to get that back. He's going to have to go down probably so far that he just lets it go and starts fighting to get it back.

At the offensive end, I didn't do a good job. I didn't find stuff for us to run.

I'm not saying any of that to lower our expectations. But I think it has to raise the sense of urgency on the part of our players. Even the ones coming back, if they think we can do what we did last year and we're on to the finals and then we'll hope the last 2 1/2 minutes will get better, that's ridiculous.

I made this decision for one reason and one reason only: I love my family.

I like it when he takes the ball off the board. It's one of the best ways to run a break. He has the ability to do that. He showed a lot of versatility. He'll play a huge role for us.

I'll help out any way I can after I spend some time with my family.

I look at this game like anything that happens is good. Any mistakes you make, you're going to be able to learn from them. And if guys play well, great.

I haven't seen too many guys spend their summers in a defensive stance.

I obviously don't know the team here, but I know they're young, I know they're offensively extremely talented ... I think the team will get better as the year goes on.

Cleveland, I don't understand why people aren't just going crazy over them,

He's probably going to miss some time, the way he was walking on it in there.

Gary's a good defender with a potentially great defensive disposition,

If Earl and Wayne have to ... play, I'm fine with that. They're good players. They've been working their butts off to be ready to play.

If Earl and Wayne have to go in and play I'm fine with that. Those two guys are good basketball players.

I don't look at our roster now and see any real holes.

The key on any team, ... is to be good defensively, everybody's got to defend.

The hard part is, from the outside, the expectation is that it is going to be very easy, you're just going to roll out there with your talent, ... That can lead to a lot of angst when things don't go well. There's a lot more to being a team than talent. I used the analogy of the Olympics with them. We have a lot of good individual players, but that is not going to be enough.

All that stuff is behind us. Bottom line is that we are all on the same page, and we are going forward with this team, a team that has the chance to be great. That is where our focus is. It is not on what happened months ago.