The Celtics lost early.<\/p>\n
The Patriots lost late.<\/p>\n
\u2018Twas a wonderful day.<\/p>\n
\u2018Tis a time to celebrate.<\/p>\n
On beating Beantown after Friday\u2019s loss:<\/p>\n
\u201cOur group is resilient. Sometimes things like that happen in Detroit. None of us like it. None of us want to go through it. Give Detroit a lot of credit, but we know it\u2019s not who we are. We played a lot better than that. We will. But I do think this group is resilient because they\u2019ve shown time and time again after tough losses or multiple losses playing the next game usually doing a pretty good job of playing again.\u201d<\/p>\n
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On the team\u2019s defensive effort:<\/p>\n
\u201cOur starter group did a nice job defensively, and I take my hat off to everybody in that locker room. Offensively, I thought we did a pretty good job of taking care of the basketball. It was big for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
On adjusting against Jaylen Brown:<\/p>\n
\u201cYou get a guy like Jaylen Brown who is a heck of a player. In the first half he was having his way with us a little bit. He was 6-for-11, he was rolling. In the second half, we did a better job defensively as a team. I got to give Mo some credit. Mo was our defensive player of the game. We threw Mo on him for a little bit. We thought we\u2019re going to try to make Jaylen work, be physical, get up into him, stuff like that, and he did it without fouling. He did a nice job with it. So to see that from a young guy at this point in his career was a lot of fun as a staff.\u201d<\/p>\n
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On the Knicks getting back to the W column:<\/p>\n
\u201cOur team is so resilient. They\u2019ve shown time and time again that after tough losses we can do a good job to come back and play again.\u201d<\/p>\n
On bounceback win in Boston after losing in Detroit:<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know we\u2019re better than we showed in Detroit.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Jose Alvarado\u2019s impact:<\/p>\n
\u201cHe brings a level of toughness to this team, his energy is unmatched. What he can do defensively in the full court and even in the front court with the ball especially on the pick-and-rolls and stuff, is at a pretty high level. He shoots it better than people think, too. We want to play fast and we believe he\u2019s a guy who will come in and push the pace, get into our offense, and all of that because he\u2019s quick and has a low center of gravity \u2014 excited to have him.\u201d<\/p>\n
On joining the Knicks:<\/p>\n
\u201cTo be honest, I can\u2019t say I ever dreamed about this. If you know my story \u2014 I\u2019m not saying I wasn\u2019t gonna make it to the NBA \u2014 but there were big questions for me. So just to be part of the city, it\u2019s such a surreal feeling. I can\u2019t wait to put the jersey on and get a few stops in it.\u201d<\/p>\n
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On returning home to NYC:<\/p>\n
\u201cToo many messages, but this is a blessing. I\u2019m from here. My family never left the city. So just to be in the atmosphere\u2014they\u2019ve been Knicks fans probably since before me, and to be on a team that\u2019s trying to contend for something and me be part of it is pretty special.\u201d<\/p>\n
On competing for a title with the Knicks:<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve gotta contend. We wanna win games, and that\u2019s what we\u2019re trying to do. And I get to be a part of that. I\u2019m excited for that. I\u2019ve just gotta be myself. Let\u2019s get this ball rolling.\u201d<\/p>\n
On responding to a missed shot pulling off a Grand Theft Alvarado:<\/p>\n
\u201cThey basically said, \u2018You\u2019re going to miss.\u2019 And I said, \u2018That\u2019s how you get it back.\u2019 Who cares about the miss if you get it back on the back tip and layup and it worked out in my favor.\u201d<\/p>\n
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On his Knicks debut feeling natural:<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s crazy. But I just feel like it was meant to be. It feels like I\u2019ve been part of it for a while, even though it was the first game. It felt like nothing. It felt like home. It felt like it was supposed to happen this way. And I\u2019m glad I did.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Puerto Rican pride:<\/p>\n
\u201cHell yeah. Can\u2019t wait. That\u2019s a big opportunity for Puerto Ricans expanding. Especially me, being Boricua.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Bad Bunny\u2019s performance:<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was the best show I\u2019ve ever been a part of. And he\u2019s just doing a great job and I\u2019m glad he\u2019s able to show it at the highest level.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Mohamed Diawara\u2019s development:<\/p>\n
\u201cI think the beginning of the year, training camp, everybody was like, \u2018He\u2019s gonna be good.\u2019 And I think with him, it was just more about getting more comfortable, more experience, more minutes, those kinds of things. But he\u2019s gonna be extremely good. He\u2019s extremely talented, defensively he can be all over the place but offensively he\u2019s knocking down shots.\u201d<\/p>\n
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On Jose Alvarado\u2019s style of play:<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s him. You know he\u2019ll be a really good on-ball defender, take the challenge, a great secondary ballhandler for us, be able to playmaking, in the paint and pressure, so what you got from today is the player you\u2019ll get.\u201d<\/p>\n
On the win over Boston:<\/p>\n
\u201cA good win.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Jose Alvarado\u2019s debut:<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was great. The impact he had on the game right away was amazing, it\u2019s what we needed and just happy to see him wearing the blue and orange.\u201d<\/p>\n
On the win in Boston on Sunday:<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were connected on defense. We tried to make things as difficult as possible.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe needed to get back to what we do, and we did that today.\u201d<\/p>\n
On adjusting to a reduced role:<\/p>\n
\u201cFor me, it\u2019s just been fluctuation of play, really. In and out the lineups. DNPs. Sometimes you\u2019re getting five minutes in the game, here and there. But it\u2019s a whole new process for me, and a new role. Offensively and defensively. They\u2019re asking me to do things defensively as well. And then offensively, I got to figure it out and make stuff out of what comes in the offense in terms of opportunities. It\u2019s not like I\u2019m featured in the offense or anything. I\u2019m playing hard, I\u2019m crashing the glass, figuring out different things \u2014 little things to be effective on that end. So it\u2019s a whole new thing for me. But I\u2019ll continue to be a pro and stay in the gym and working on my craft and keep it going.\u201d<\/p>\n
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On defensive responsibilities:<\/p>\n
\u201cSometimes I have to guard maybe the second or third option with a different unit. I\u2019m usually guarding weaker guys on different teams. But yeah, being asked to do that at some times, on different plays, it\u2019s all an adjustment.\u201d<\/p>\n
On embracing a new role:<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not that big of an adjustment. But it takes some getting used to, for sure. I\u2019m in a whole new role and try to play the best role I can on this team.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Celtics lost early. The Patriots lost late. \u2018Twas a wonderful day. \u2018Tis a time to celebrate. On…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":592838,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3],"tags":[7,75,296,568,288,78,2131,11053,327,17348,6,191],"class_list":{"0":"post-592837","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-boston-celtics","10":"tag-detroit","11":"tag-getty-images","12":"tag-jalen-brunson","13":"tag-jaylen-brown","14":"tag-jordan-clarkson","15":"tag-jose-alvarado","16":"tag-josh-hart","17":"tag-mohamed-diawara","18":"tag-nba","19":"tag-new-york-knicks"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116041686889829970","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592837","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=592837"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592837\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/592838"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=592837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=592837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=592837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}