James Borrego on protection vs. Dallas, Herb Jones | Pelicans-Mavericks Postgame Interview 11/14/23
Pelicans Associate Head Coach James Borrego
On having Herb Jones again within the rotation:
“That’s what Herb does. He’s everywhere. He fuels our defense. He covers mistakes. He’s so active. To do what he did tonight…Luka’s (Dončić) a phenomenal player, so to do what he did tonight defensively, he deserves a ton of credit. He belongs in the defensive player of the year category, in my opinion. He has that type of effect on a game and you saw that early on. He set the tone for us. I think BI (Brandon Ingram) and Z (Zion Williamson) set the tone for us offensively. The way they shared it, they moved it [and] trusted their teammates. I couldn’t be more proud of those guys.”
On sharing the ball and posting 33 assists in this night’s recreation:
“That’s the vision. That’s the hops. That’s the goal. We’re tougher to guard. We have plenty of weapons on the floor if we trust each other and space the floor. As I said earlier in the press conference, spacing is critical for us. Tonight, we trusted our spacing, we got into our sets, we moved the ball [and] guys knocked it down. Even when we didn’t make shots we were there to gobble up some offensive rebounds and put pressure on them. So, keeping our pace is really important, but also, getting to our spots quickly in spacing and trusting each other is the vision.”
Herb Jones on group protection, go back from harm | Pelicans-Mavericks Postgame Interview 11/14/23
Pelicans Forward Herb Jones
On the group’s mindset this night after dropping to the Mavericks Sunday:
“We were lacking that sense of urgency. As a team we watched the film, we went back, we talked amongst each other, and just said we needed to come out. We knew we needed to come out with a higher level of energy and a higher level of focus and we did that tonight.”
On the significance of getting Naji Marshall again:
“Super important. He’s a spark off the bench, especially defensively. We are going to need it all season – from everybody, the whole roster. As long as everybody brings it every night, I feel like we got a good chance of winning.”
Zion Williamson on offense vs. Mavs, teammates in win | Pelicans-Mavericks Postgame Interview 11/14/23
Pelicans Forward Zion Williamson
On the variation in offensive float this night as opposed to the closing recreation:
“I mean we just…we just took a bad loss on our own home court two days ago. That’s why I said, ‘That’s the beauty of the NBA.’ You get to see the team again two days later, and we came out here and handled business. Now we have to keep the momentum going.”
On the group’s defensive efficiency this night as opposed to Sunday’s recreation:
“It started with Dyson (Daniels). I know everybody has their own opinions but Dyson pressing up full court like that. It’s not easy to make Luka (Dončić) get out of his game. He was really getting into Luka so, it started with Dyson and carried onto everybody else.”
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