Portland Trail Blazers‘ Terry Stotts is known to be one of the most calm and relaxed head coaches in the league and rarely gets fired up. But things were not the same during halftime of his team's game against the Denver Nuggets on Sunday.
Despite playing on a back-to-back set, the Nuggets were the ones who came out with more energy and outplayed the Blazers in the first half. They found themselves facing as much as a 17-point deficit in the second quarter but were able to cut it down to seven at the half, 50-57.
After seeing his squad play poorly in the first half, Stotts blasted his team at the break which had some of his players like Ed Davis and Evan Turner go as far as describing his fiery speech as not safe to be shown on live television as he was very upset with the their performance.
Davis: “It’s a little too much for TV, man. You know Coach is more of a chill, laid-back cool guy, but once he gets mad and starts to express himself, you know that you definitely want to fight for him. We knew what we did, he didn’t really have to say anything. We knew we were playing terrible, but he definitely gave it to us. We’ll leave it at that.”
“It was starting to get ugly, down 17 at home to a team that probably won’t make the playoffs, to a team that was on a back-to-back, it’s unacceptable. We definitely had to wake up. We needed that third-quarter effort in the first quarter. It’s a 48-minute game, and all that matters at the end of the day is what the end score is.”
Turner: “He was kinda upset a little bit, he was really upset. At times when I thought he should get upset, he doesn't, but this time he was extra pissed. It definitely fired us up, and I think we chipped in and tried our best to respond.
The 58-year-old bench tactician's speech may have done the trick as the Blazers started the second half with a lot of intensity especially on defense. They were able to complete a comeback and come out with the win on the night, 112-105.
Stotts gave credit to his players for the effort they gave and listening to what he said during halftime. He also talked about what they did right to get the win.
“I was really glad with how we responded after halftime. The first half was very disappointing. Denver outplayed us, they outhustled us. We were able to make some hustle plays at the end of the first half that got us back into it, but I liked the way we responded after halftime. The third quarter was terrific at both ends and obviously set the tone for getting the win.”
The veteran head coach hopes that his team will be able to continue to build on the momentum they have and come out with another win on Tuesday when they face the Chicago Bulls.
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