HEAT Head Coach Pat Riley

On the game...
“Finally, we closed the game out. We had a nice lead in the third quarter and the same thing that happened to us, happened to us again, but we gathered ourselves. I think Mike (James) was a catalyst. We did a good job going down the stretch and we got the win.”

On the Caron Butler...
“I think Caron (Butler) got up well on his jumper. He wasn’t conceding anything to him (Michael Jordan). He showed him respect by playing him so tough. I thought Caron maybe took a few too many pull up jumpers. He has a tough mind and we have to get him better. We just keep him working on the defensive end of his game. He has the ability and mindset to become an excellent defender in this league.”

On the atmosphere of the game...
“It was great. I’d like to think that they (the fans) all came to see us play tonight and let our guys know that they are somebody; but the reality is that a lot of people came see to Michael (Jordan). It was nice for us to win in that environment. It was a good win for us tonight from that standpoint. There were a lot of fans that we have not seen most of the year. We want to try to put something in their minds to get the fans to come back.”

On the game and playing against Michael Jordan...
“It was a tough challenge, playing against the greatest player of all time. You can’t back down. I just tried to go down there and play hard. He’s a great player on both ends of the floor. It was fun out there. I wasn’t listening if he was talking, I was in a zone and keyed into the game. I thought he played hard the whole game. He’s got six rings and I’m still working. It was a crazy game. Fortunately we came out on top. I’m grateful for the chance to play against the best player of all time.”

On the Caron Butler playing against Michael Jordan...
“He did a great job. He kept going at him. Over the years guys wouldn’t attack him. I think your best defense is to attack him on the offensive end. I thought he (Caron) did a great job of being explosive and getting to the basket. He got a few ‘and-ones’ and completed some plays for other guys.”

On the crowd...
“It’s always great to play before a full house. The atmosphere was great. There was a lot of energy in the arena.”

On Mike James...
“I told him in the first half that he was hesitating on his shot. I told him to get out there and shoot the ball with confidence. In that third and fourth quarter he made big plays for us when we needed him to. Mike (James) always, during stretches of games, does something that we need him to do and I am used to seeing a lot of that from him.”

On Mike James...
“Teams don’t really know what he’s going to do because he’s such a great finisher. He’s not only taking it to the hole, but he’s finding people. He’s finding the open man. Now teams hesitate instead of collapsing on him because they don’t know if he’s going to throw it to the open man. He stepped up big for us today. It was a gritty game. It was war down there; scratching, clawing and kicking and we came out on top.”

On the game...
“I think what happened was when it counted, Miami just out toughed us. I thought we played eight minutes of team basketball today and that was in the third quarter. We played defense, we moved the ball. They (Miami) scored the last two possessions of the third quarter and the first nine possessions of the fourth quarter. You can’t win like that. They (Miami) defended us real well. They make you take the extra pass and today was one of those games that I didn’t think we brought out the best in each other. I thought we were disconnected all game except for that eight minute stretch in the third quarter.”

“Against this team you need to have someone to run your offense because they’re going to trap you, they’re going to pressure the ball, they’re going to try to disrupt you and Juan (Dixon) is still learning. It is hard for him to run our offense right now. Anthony (Goldwire) did a great job for us tonight. He made a couple good shots tonight.”

“We lead the league in giving things away at the end of quarters. When I sat Michael (Jordan) down with 50.6 seconds left in the third quarter, we had the lead. Last night we gave up five points in twenty seconds, and tonight we gave up four or five points in twenty seconds. We just don’t handle the end of quarters very well. It is a credit to them (Miami), they deserved to win. They really outplayed us from start to finish. They physically knocked us around.”

“We are so thin right now in the perimeter, I have to pick and choose my substitutions because in three or four minutes we can get out of sync real fast.”

On Caron Butler...
“He is a competitor. Once I saw that Pat [Riley] was going to make him a focus of the offense, I felt I had a defensive tackle on my hands. I had to pick out some things that I felt that he was incapable of doing, so I took away his right hand. He is a tough task, but I did not let him get into a rhythm. He is a challenge and he does not back down from any challenge.”

On the Cheers on the Road...
“It is appreciation. When you can get cheers on the road that says that you have been doing some thing pretty good. Either playing good basketball, beating their team or just a sense of respect for the game over the years and I am very appreciative of that.”

On the Game...
“We just got out of rhythm offensively. We got in a good rhythm in the third quarter. But once we got into the fourth quarter we let them score, I think nine times in row, and they were off and running and we never really made a stop defensively. It was a game that we could never really get in sink defensively.”

On Making the Playoffs...
“It is very important for us to finish strong and make the playoffs. Hopefully we can finish off strong.”

On the game...
“I think I just have to go out there and play hard. They (the coaches) expect you to make mistakes, so there is no pressure on me. All the guys have been great to me. They just expect me to go out an play hard.”