Chauncey Billups
Chauncey Billups
Chauncey Ray Billupsis an American retired professional basketball player who played 17 seasons in the National Basketball Association. A star at the University of Colorado, he was selected third overall in the 1997 NBA draft by the Boston Celtics. A five-time NBA All-Star and a three-time All-NBA selection, Billups played for the Celtics, Toronto Raptors, Denver Nuggets, Minnesota Timberwolves, Detroit Pistons, New York Knicks, and Los Angeles Clippers during his NBA career. He won the NBA Finals MVP in 2004...
ProfessionBasketball Player
Date of Birth25 September 1976
CityDenver, CO
I am a little more excited now because we've got some good teams coming in over the next week or so. I am looking forward to that.
This was a very big win, but we won't know how big for a while.
We go back to the hotel instead of to the airplane.
To have those nerves to make those plays at the end of a game isn't something you really can be taught. It's instinct I think.
We always knew a championship ring means way more than being an all-star, although we wanted to be all-stars. This is just secondary. It's not going to make me feel the same way as I felt when I was on that big stage in the finals when I won a championship. At the same time, it's going to be up there, because it's going to validate what I always felt about myself.
We felt we had a chance to win this series, but nobody else felt that. We knew we were the only ones who believed in us.
We changed up our scheme a little bit defensively and made them take tougher shots. Once we made our adjustments and changed our scheme a little bit at halftime, we started hitting some shots as well, and our defense picked our offense up, too.
We're trying to get back to our winning ways right. That's more important. We still have three more games.
We feel like we have a special group of guys in here. Any time we have a chance to do something special, to get into those (record) books, that gives people something to remember us by, you know? We want that, man. We want to be a group that people will remember around here for a long time.
We wanted nothing but a win, not showboating or any of that. That's just how we play. ... We don't have the personnel to play that other way.
Even though (Brown) loves the rookies he has - because they play extremely hard and he loves anybody who plays hard and plays right - he is at the stage of his coaching career and life where he needs veteran players. Larry loves guys who have been in fights and wars and know what to do every time they're out on the court. That's why I think he'd love to get a guy like Kenyon Martin .
Both teams wanted to win this game in the worst way. It was kind of an ugly game, but the intensity was there. This was a playoff game. It really was.
We will be fine. I guarantee we will be fine.
We talked about it in the locker room before the game, that this was the game we needed. We felt they hadn't been tested in this postseason, they hadn't played against a team like us that plays defense, believes in itself and tries to control the tempo of the game. Yesterday was a good game to show them that.