Coach Mike Brown speaks after Pistons-Cavs Game 4
InsideHoops.com NewsWire | May 29, 2007
Tuesday night in Eastern conference finals Game 4 of the 2007 NBA Playoffs the Cleveland Cavaliers beat the Detroit Pistons 91-87 to the series at two games apiece. Here's what Cavs coach Mike Brown said after the game:
Coach Mike Brown's Game 4 Recap
What a game. I tell you what, first thing I want to acknowledge is our crowd. I thought our crowd was terrific tonight. They were into it the entire ballgame and they really gave us some juice down the stretch so that was great. The whole season, the whole playoff run, they've been great, but tonight especially down the stretch they were huge.
I mean, I had so many guys contribute tonight. It was a total team effort. Obviously Daniel Gibson, he played well, he did a nice job attacking the rim, he did a nice job trying to be the aggressor on both ends of the floor, and it paid off well.
I thought Larry Hughes, I thought his minutes were really special, because he gave us a good start and we weren't going into this game one-man short or down. In terms of having him as our starter, he gutted it out and went out there and started the ballgame for us and did some nice things and it allowed us to play our normal way with our rotation.
I thought Eric Snow was huge. Eric Snow sat for 46 minutes and 55 seconds or something like that, and I called his number, and, you know, if you're 27, 28 years old, you can do that. But he's a veteran, who at times needs to get himself going, but tonight he came in and he made a huge play for us coming up with that loose ball. And then he stepped up and not taking a shot in four, five hours, since the beginning of the game, he knocks down a free-throw to stretch it to four. Not only that he comes in and their first play they went to Tayshaun, and he did a nice job on Tayshaun and we get a turnover out of it. So Eric's minutes were big, huge.
Drew Gooden, especially in the second half, again, you're not stopping a guy like Rasheed Wallace. The only thing you can do with a guy like Rasheed Wallace, Richard Hamilton, Chauncey Billups, Tayshaun Prince, the only thing you can do with those guys is make them work for their shots, and I thought Drew was good in the second half. I thought he did a nice job making Rasheed Wallace work for his shots and, again, you can't stop him, you've just got to make him work, and Drew did his job by making him work. And then he hit some big baskets. He spaced the floor and waited for them to double-team LeBron, found the open hole, we found him and he knocked down the shots.
The last guy obviously I want to talk about is LeBron. What a huge night. You know, we had nice production off the bench, Drew put some points up on the board for us, and, you know, we got to the fourth quarter and then he did his thing, took over. Two games in a row where he's taken over that fourth quarter and put us on his big, broad shoulders and said come along for the ride, and two games in a row we went for the ride and he carried us home. Terrific ballgame by him and it was big of him to step to that free-throw line and knock those two free-throws down to seal the deal.
We said before the game that Rip and Chauncey were going to come out and be aggressive, and they were, and that's what got them going. Both those guys had a tremendous game.
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