Flip Saunders
Flip Saunders
Philip Daniel "Flip" Saunderswas an American basketball player and coach. During his career, he coached the Minnesota Timberwolves, Detroit Pistons, and Washington Wizards...
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth23 February 1955
CityCleveland, OH
coaches exhibition guess improve last maybe people ready regular season trying week
Very much so. It's something as coaches that we're not used to. You don't really go through that very much. I guess I would liken it to maybe the last week of the exhibition season when you're trying to get ready for the regular season. You want to improve and you want to keep sharp, you want to give people opportunities, you want to be competitive and you still want to win.
aggressive calls fall loose lose seemed team
We seemed to lose our energy. They were more aggressive and the team that's more aggressive is going to get the loose balls, get the calls and have things fall their way.
best defensive known league played team zone
We've been known in the league that we played the best zone defense, when I was in Minnesota, ... In one day, I can tell you that we're going to be a much better zone defensive team than we were in Minnesota.
both defense fun game people sure turned
The defense turned it up, no question. Offensively, we turned things up. ... It was at both ends. That's why this has been a championship team. It was a fun game to watch. I'm sure the people at TNT got their money's worth.
four last sets
We've had, what, four sets of back-to-backs here in the last 15 days? It's been a grind.
deserving question wait
We'll have to wait and see what happens. There's no question that he's deserving and that he's going to be an All-Star someday.
bit changed coming good job lower rip room screens setting took
We did a good job setting screens. We changed it a little bit on some of his runs. He did more change of pace. He'd change, run, stop, then he took off again. And Chauncey delivered. We set screens a little bit lower to get Rip a little bit more room coming off those screens to try and read.
kicked step
We didn't have the step they did. They kicked our butts every which way.
cheat decided good looks starting throw
We went to our bread-and-butter play to see how they were guarding it. They were starting to cheat over the top, so we decided to throw up over it a little bit, and we got some good looks and we got some separation. That's why (Hamilton is) an All-Star.
bottom deep offense team
Bottom line, we are a multi-dimensional team that can play different ways. We can play inside, we can play deep perimeter and we can play mid-range. We can do different things and that's what makes our offense so effective.
call cheat extra far game last list maybe plays question run scouting sheet situations time week wrinkles
Every time I go into a game I have, I don't know if you want to call it a cheat sheet or whatever, but I have a list of plays that I'm probably going to run that night. And there's no question that this last week that list has been a lot shorter as far as things we're going to run. There's some things we've put in, some wrinkles in some situations and maybe we'll lay away from some of those not to give them an extra scouting opportunity.
ben free harder motivates stretch throws
Ben usually makes big free throws down the stretch and when he misses, it motivates him to play harder defensively.
ben final last lock minutes needed night played
Ben played 56 minutes last night (in Memphis), and he played 41 tonight. Yet, he was able to do what he did. When we needed to lock down in the final two minutes, he pretty much did it.
ben mistakes
Ben erases a lot of mistakes for us. He was unbelievable with everything he was doing.