Avery Johnson covered quite a few topics - about the game itself, the Knicks, and many other things - in a nearly 15-minute long pre-game press conference Monday night. Here are a few of his standout quotes from the pre-Knicks presser:
On the recent lack of CJ Watson and Deron Williams playing together: “I think it’s because of the matchups; sometimes when we’re a bit smaller in the backcourt, we’ve had trouble rebounding the ball, and it’s forced Deron to exert a lot more energy defensively battling some bigger guys. Statistically, it hasn’t really worked as well as we wanted it to, so with everybody healthy, it seems to help us when we’re bigger at the 2. I’m not saying we won’t use (that backcourt) in a situation we like it against, though.”
On defending Carmelo Anthony: “Carmelo is a 3 who plays some small 4, but with the starting lineup, it’s really Brewer doing a lot of the dirty work and slashing to the basket. That’s kind of the trick; I don’t know how other teams feel, but with their starters, he’s more of a 3. Now, when they go small, with Felton and Kidd or J.R. Smith or Steve Novak, then I think he’s more of a 4, so the key is trying to put pressure on him when he’s on defense, knowing exactly where he is on offense, and trying to give him a lot of different looks.”
On whether or not playing the Knicks is “more important” than other games: “As important as it is to us…it’s just as important to them, because if we’re the new kids on the block so to speak and try to take over some territorial rights, they’re going to try harder to push back as much as they can. I don’t think it’s so much of a Duke-North Carolina rivalry yet, but I think it’s great.”
On what he expects from the crowd: “I think in my first two years here, it was basically an 80/20 split for their side (at Prudential Center); I hope that the 80/20 split is on our side tonight (Laughs). Again, I hope the fans in the building will be real proud of our team; even when we’re not playing well, my assistants tell me that the crowd is still really into the game. I assume we’ll hear the “Brooklyn” chant a little bit more tonight, from start to finish, but it means a lot to our guys and I think it will be interesting to see what happens, both tonight and when we play again.”
On whether they can take any "moral victories" away from tonight: "This year, it’s never really good to lose a game. At some point, we want to be a contender and a playoff team with an opportunity to win a championship, so for us, it’s never really good to lose; we’re not into moral victories. We want to protect our home court, I think that’s important, so again for us, we want to try to come out and play well and minimize our mistakes. Our players know what it takes to win, they have a defensive rating that’s kind of our bible, and there’s a certain way we like to play offensively. We know on our team who our scorers are and where they like to get the ball, and we know how to attack defenses.”
