Speaker 1: One on Sports Talk seven ninety It is the Matt
Thomas Show with the Ross Ross that they off. Let's
spend tenqulty minutes right now with the head basketball coach
of your second seeded Western Conference playoffs, Houston Rockets email.
Speaker 2: I don't over with this on the show, coach, Thanks
for joining me late this morning.
Speaker 1: A thought or two about first of all, capturing the
two seed, and obviously you sat out some folks against
the Clippers of the night, and what's it like being
in a in a really good spot here we can
rest some guys between now and the end of the
regular season.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is an accomplishment.
Speaker 3: Obviously, got more to go, but you know, our guys
should be proud of where we're at and the fact
that we earned some rest and are in a position
to pick our own, our own destiny and fate instead
of having to rely on anybody else. There'll be in
the late season battles like a lot of teams are
doing right now. So guys understand that they deserve it.
They put in the work to get here, and now
it's chance to get healed up, rested up, sharpened up
and give some other guys some opportunities so we can
improve our depth.
Speaker 1: Is everybody. I mean, by the time that you guys
get started, you feel like I'll bey'll be back to
close to one hundred percent. Is this is this off time
between not only these games that they may or may
not playing in the week off. Is that is that
put you as close one hundred percent as possible?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 3: Absolutely, I mean other than All Star break, you don't
get this amount of time off in the season at all.
Speaker 2: And so we got guys nicked up.
Speaker 3: You know, Ifrid got the ankle, Jabari had come off
the ankle and got a little growing some up, you
got a little back and things here and there. They
could obviously play through if we needed to, but a
chance to get healed up obviously in these games. Don't
want to be off too long. So we'll get in
some work in the next two games. But chance to
stay sharp, get rested, get healed, and at this time
of year, with that week off before the playoffs, avoiding
the playing is a big advantage as well.
Speaker 1: So is there gonna be a big watch party at
the Adoka House on Tuesday night to see who you play.
Speaker 3: Not a watch party, but I'll be watching alone to
see something like that.
Speaker 2: Obviously, myself and.
Speaker 3: The staff will be prepared for two opponents, and so
we'll have a step ahead regardless of who it is,
and then obviously focused and zero in on the opponent
once we figure out who it is. But it's a
little bit different than the years past, where you may
know a week before who you're going to play based
on the shootings. The player brings another element to that,
but exciting for the fans, opportunity for other teams to
sneak in. But we have to prepare for two as
if we're playing each of them.
Speaker 1: You may have your personal favorite, and I wouldn't ask
of that of you because I have my personal favorite,
and I don't want to give that out too much either.
But the point being is that you know, I've looked
at the standing. I look at it every day. I
look at it fifteen times a day. I didn't anticipate
the Spurs beating the Warriors a couple of nights back,
and then they lose that game, and then Memphis loses
to Minnesota and that moves up the Golden State of
the six spot. It's incredible how tight these teams are
and how you try to anticipate who you might be playing,
and it would be frankly idiotic to do it because
things could just change here a lot in the next
forty eight hours.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's why.
Speaker 3: Ever since, probably with ten games out, twenty games out,
we've worried about ourselves and wanted to be in this
position to solidify our seed and not have to worry
about anybody or get the help. And at this point,
to your point, it could be anybody changes on a
nightly basis, and a lot of these teams are playing
each other heads up, so it can change and flip flop,
like you said, game to game, night to night, and
so for us, so we worried about ourselves. We'll figure
out the opponent when it's there and not try to
get too cute and manipulate anything. And like I said,
being in the number two seed with the day is
off and the rest is that was our goal. Be healthy,
be playing our best basketball, be sharp, and then we've
achieved that.
Speaker 1: You might not have said this yet, but I know
there's going to be a speech coming up from you
about what playoff basketball is. Like Dylan knows about it,
Steven knows about it, Fred knows about it. But you've
got a lot of young men that don't. So what
have you told them from your experience about the game
of the NBA playoffs that is unlike a regular season game.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that everything's heightened.
Speaker 3: I think we've done a pretty good job of building
toward that in the last ten games. We obviously our
last eight games, I think seven of those were against
high level teams, playoff contenders, and so we already had
our mindset around starting to shift our mentality towards that
preparing for the playoffs.
Speaker 2: So we don't have to flip a switch.
Speaker 3: But what we do is what we do, and it
carries well in the playoffs. Of physicality, the effort that
we play with, all those things are great things going forward,
but you have to experience them for the first time.
But at the same time, keep its simple as just
basketball and what we do works and what we've done
all year the guys have bought into so at the
end of the day, that will carry over.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 3: I'll let the bets talk to the guys about experience
as well, but we'll share our stories. But getting out
there and getting a feed wet for the first time
is the best way to handle it.
Speaker 1: What do you think was more impactful, and it could
be both. The answer to it, you guys playing more
zone second half of the year or you going to
the double big lineup second.
Speaker 2: Half the year.
Speaker 3: Well, they coincided with each other, honestly, and so the
reason obviously, when you play a smaller lineup, we can
switch some things and the results are great. I mean
we're top whatever three in the league and defense and
so what we do mainly works.
Speaker 2: No doubt.
Speaker 3: But when you want to play the double bigs, which
is really good offensively, you have to go to the
zone with some of those smaller lineups, and so they
coincide with each other. The more double big we played
and teams don't match it, they try to downsize. We
have to play some zone for matchup purposes, and our
zone is really good. Communication is good. We got active
at great activity. Feels like we are talking even more
in the zone than a man. And then on the
offensive end we take advantage. We have big bodies down
there getting second third opportunities and so they go hand
to hand, no doubt. But even when we do play
with one big, we do like our zone. The activity
is good, keep teams out of rhythm and protect guys,
if them poule trouble or a little bit of rest.
Speaker 1: You may talk with us for a few more minutes
here on the Matt Thomas Show with Ross you may
you took the Celtics of the NBA Finals and you
played three series and one them. What is it like
for the players? Just look, video is a huge part
of it. Are there a lot of things that teams
will throw at you different wrinkles or is it just
kind of accentuate the stuff that you want to do?
I mean meaning, is there anything that the other teams
could be hiding that they have not put out until
the playoffs? And would that surprise you at all if
teams would make a massive shift or is that just
doesn't happen in the NBA in right now.
Speaker 2: Oh, it's a little bit of both.
Speaker 3: You have to do what you do really well and
then obviously somebody's going to make an adjustment at some point.
If if what you're doing is working, obviously stick with
it and try to amplify that. But teams that are
struggling will obviously go to adjustments. And that's the job
of the coaching staff to have you know, plan ABC
D E. If you need b and for us, I
think we've thrown a lot out our guys this year,
mixing some things to keep teams off balanced, off rhythm,
and you don't throw it all out in a meaningless game,
but you save certain things that you've seen worked well.
And then obviously you have all the stuff in your
back pocket and so if you if what you're doing works,
you go with it until need be, but expecting other
teams to throw adjustments if they're struggling in a certain
area or trying to take advantage of something.
Speaker 2: So it's a little bit of a chess match.
Speaker 3: Of course, much different than a regular season game where
you're preparing for that team one time and then you're
moving on to the next. It's back and forth ups
and downs of a playoff series, and a lot of
times it comes down to.
Speaker 2: That in your mind and your history of being in
the league.
Speaker 1: Are the whistles tighter or are they a little looser
come playoff time?
Speaker 3: No, I definitely think they let you play more, which,
like I said, goes well for us.
Speaker 2: You know, we want to be a physical team.
Speaker 3: We are one of the more aggressive physical teams, and
at times we have to adjust to how they're calling
it in a regular season game. In the playoffs, the
game slows down, the physicality goes up, and I think,
like I said, what we do well well, we do
well travels in the playoff and so it's not like
we're trying to flip a switch and become aggressive all
of a sudden. That's who we've been all year, and
so they let you play more, no doubt. I think,
like we said, the pace slows down, you have to
grind out possessions on both sides of the ball, and
so it bodes well for us. It's in our favor
to have that, and we like the games that they
let us play aggressive, and so that's that's the case
in the playoffs.