A tres Bientot sur le site!!
]]>A tres Bientot sur le site!!
]]>Le 3eme Match se déroulera le Samedi 8 Mai a Atlanta a 17h00 ET(Eastern Time).
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]]>Mickael Pietrus insists he has no regrets.
Pietrus didn’t flash his thousand-watt smile minutes after the Magic fell 99-86 to the…
Mickael Pietrus insists he has no regrets.
Pietrus didn’t flash his thousand-watt smile minutes after the Magic fell 99-86 to the Lakers and Los Angeles clinched the NBA title on Sunday night, but he still managed to put a positive spin on Orlando’s playoff run.
“It was a wonderful experience,” he said. “I always dreamed about making it to the NBA Finals and this team worked very hard together. It was very special for us. I wish we could have won the championship, but we learned a lot as a team.”
Pietrus is one of many Magic players who has displayed a remarkable ability to shrug off adversity.
He said he doesn’t think about missing an off-balance jumper in the waning seconds of regulation during a pivotal Game 4 that could have given Orlando another precious win. And he refuses to discuss any of his defensive decisions or errant shots throughout the playoffs.
“The Lakers played very well and we hope to do the same thing they did next year,” Pietrus said. “They went to the NBA Finals and lost last year. This year, they came back stronger and they are champions. We will work hard this offseason and want to become champions.”
It’s the same optimistic outlook Pietrus has been pushing all season.
He doesn’t get as much attention as smile king Dwight Howard, but he proved to be a happy-go-lucky tour de force for the Magic.
“I think life is good and no matter what, no matter the situation you’re in, you have to get a smile on your face,” he said.
The team has been criticized for smiling a little too much and having too much fun throughout the playoffs, but Orlando has never been fueled by the frowns favored by the Lakers.
“That’s our team,” point guard Rafer Alston said. “That’s who we’ve been all season.”
Pietrus relished his role as the Magic’s secret weapon coming off the bench during the postseason, but he was one of many guns that misfired Sunday night.
He finished Game 5 with four points on 2-of-5 field-goal shooting in 16 minutes.
He entered Sunday averaging 10.8 points in 26.1 minutes per game in the playoffs. Along with timely 3-pointers, Pietrus played relentless defense. He drew some of the Magic’s toughest assignments, often guarding the Cavs’ LeBron James and the Lakers’ Kobe Bryant.
Orlando was much stronger in the playoffs when Pietrus also packed an offensive punch. The team went 9-4 in the postseason when Pietrus scored more than 10 points and 4-7 when he failed to score at least 11 for the Magic.
“I learned how tough it is in the NBA and how tough it is to win in the playoffs,” he said. “We are down right now, but we will come back from this stronger.”
ORLANDO, Fla. — In a locker room of jokers and pranksters, Mickael Pietrus occupies a critical role.
“One of the ringleaders of silliness,” said Otis Smith, the Orlando Magic’s general…
ORLANDO, Fla. — In a locker room of jokers and pranksters, Mickael Pietrus occupies a critical role.
“One of the ringleaders of silliness,” said Otis Smith, the Orlando Magic’s general manager.
If there is a halfcourt shooting contest, Pietrus will be the one whooping and hollering. When the jokes start flying, he will get the last laugh, and the biggest one.
“Whenever you try to crack a joke, he’s going to have a nice comeback,” Magic guard Anthony Johnson said. “He’s more the comeback type.”
In other words, Pietrus gives as good as he gets, which is a useful skill at this time of the year in the N.B.A.
For three rounds of the playoffs, Pietrus traded blows with some of the N.B.A.’s most imposing scorers. He guarded Philadelphia’s Andre Iguodala, Boston’s Paul Pierce and Cleveland’s LeBron James. For an encore, Pietrus is wrestling nightly with the Los Angeles Lakers’ Kobe Bryant, one of the most dynamic scorers of his generation, with nothing less than a championship at stake.
Once again, Pietrus is absorbing blows and dishing them out, a comeback artist at work. Bryant had 31 points Tuesday night, but Pietrus had the last laugh: his late steal and two free throws helped the Magic secure its first victory of the N.B.A. finals, 108-104. The Lakers hold a 2-1 lead in the series, which resumes Thursday night.
Bryant dominated the first quarter, making 7 of 10 shots for 17 points, as the Lakers took control. But the Magic’s defense, led by Pietrus, held Bryant to 4-for-15 shooting the rest of the game.
Pietrus had his best game of the series on both ends of the court, with 18 points, stiff defense against Bryant and several clutch plays down the stretch. His put-back dunk with 2 minutes 19 seconds left gave Orlando the lead for good, 101-99. Moments later, he combined with Dwight Howard to trap Bryant on a high pick-and-roll and flustered him into a turnover. Pietrus came up with the ball, was fouled by Bryant and converted the free throws.
“Obviously,” Coach Stan Van Gundy said, “the pressure doesn’t bother him at all.”
Pietrus is 27 but a relative playoff neophyte. This is his first trip to the finals and only the second postseason run of his career. He was a reserve for the Golden State Warriors when they upset the top-seeded Dallas Mavericks in 2007.
The lessons are coming in rapid fire, most of them courtesy of Bryant. At 6 feet 6 inches and 215 pounds, Pietrus is long and rangy, and athletic enough to stick with Bryant. But his best efforts often go for naught. He bodies Bryant, and Bryant fades away for a jumper. He puts a hand in Bryant’s face, and Bryant shoots past it.
Twice in Game 3, Bryant pump-faked Pietrus into the air, then jumped into him to draw a foul, once at the 3-point line. Bryant did the same to Courtney Lee, the Magic’s starting guard.
Pietrus, a Frenchman who speaks English as a second language, needed only one adjective to describe the task of guarding Bryant.
“He’s really tough,” Pietrus said, his head dipping and his grin growing wide. “Tough, tough-tough, tough-tough-tough-tough-tough shots.”
It has been a taxing but memorable spring for Pietrus, who has emerged as a top-flight defender and a lethal 3-point shooter. A month ago, he was virtually unknown. But Magic officials knew what they were getting when they signed him last summer, to a four-year contract worth about $22 million. Smith, the Magic’s general manager, was the Warriors’ executive director of basketball operations in 2003 when they drafted Pietrus with the 11th overall pick.
“I think actually what we’re seeing from him is only the tip of what he can do,” Smith said. “I think he’s capable of doing much more than he’s done.”
It took some time for Pietrus to adapt and live up to his contract. Van Gundy preaches defense first, but Pietrus had spent five years playing for Coach Don Nelson, who has little regard for anything but offense.
“It took a long time for him to get acclimated to all our defensive schemes and our terminology,” said the Magic assistant coach Brendan Malone. “He was also having a hard time buying into being a defensive player, period. He saw himself as an offensive player.”
Pietrus opened the season as a starter and was just beginning to find his way when injuries intervened. He spent most of December and January recovering from a torn thumb ligament and a broken right wrist.
Eventually, Pietrus got healthy and established himself as a key rotation player, which he was never able to do at Golden State. Nelson never trusted Pietrus to do much more than shoot corner 3-pointers.
In their 2007 playoff run, the Warriors produced T-shirts with the slogan “We Believe.” Pietrus was part of that riveting chapter, but he was not considered a vital piece of the team’s long-term plans.
“No, they believe in the T-shirt, but they wouldn’t believe in me,” he said.
Pietrus never connected with Nelson, but he formed a bond with the Warriors assistant coach Keith Smart, who, he says, is “like my dad.” He added, “Every time I need some confidence, I call him.”
Not that Pietrus seems to lack for confidence these days. Asked if he always had these skills but just needed a chance to display them, Pietrus smiled and said: “You said it. You just said it.”
Now Pietrus is starting to resemble a younger version of James Posey, the rugged defender and 3-point marksman who helped Boston and Miami win titles this decade. Pietrus is shooting a crisp 40 percent on 3-pointers in the playoffs.
Pietrus has no baseline for comparing this experience to any other moment in his career. But the nightly battles with Bryant do not seem to faze him.
“I remember when I first came in the N.B.A., I was like, I would like to win a championship,” he said. “I’m in the N.B.A. finals now. I don’t realize how big it is, because I’ve never been there.”
Pietrus made it sound enjoyable, like a child’s first trip to Disney World.
“Hopefully, I’m going to win it,” he chirped. “That’d be nice, huh?”
It wouldn’t have been surprising to see a “Help Wanted” sign hanging outside the Orlando Magic locker room…
It wouldn’t have been surprising to see a “Help Wanted” sign hanging outside the Orlando Magic locker room before Game 3 Tuesday night.
After providing a nice lift at key points in each of their first three playoff series, the Magic’s reserves had stalled in the first two games in the Finals.
Entering Game 3 Orlando had just played the Los Angeles reserves to a tie: 46-46.
It remained even Tuesday night 24-24 but the biggest bench performance belonged to the Magic.
But his biggest contribution was defensive.
With the Magic clinging to a 104-102 lead with under a minute to play, Lakers’ guard Kobe Bryant lost the handle in the half court on their ensuing possession. In the scramble, Pau Gasol fell on it, but Pietrus picked his pass attempt from the floor.
Pietrus was fouled as he broke away down the court and made both of his free-throws to put Orlando up 106-102 and help seal the win.
“We got him a couple of good traps on [Bryant],” Coach Stan Van Gundy said. “You have to keep your hands back on all of his traps because you don’t want to touch him He just lost the ball. Mickael made both free-throws it was very big.”
A big reason was that the Magic’s top postseason sparkplug, Pietrus had lost is pep between Games 1 and 2.
He had a decent outing with 11 points in 32 minutes off the bench in the series opener. But he followed that up with just two points in Game 2 as he battled foul trouble and eventually fouled out after just 23 minutes of action.
He made several big shots Tuesday, though. While Coach Stan Van Gundy liked the play at the very end, he said the biggest might have been a tip-dunk with 2:41 left in fourth quarter to break a 99-all tie.
“Pietrus gave us a huge lift,” Van Gundy said. “I thought one of the biggest baskets was his follow dunk at the end I thought that was maybe the biggest shot of the game.”
The Magic bench outscored L.A.’s reserves 12-10 in the opening 24 minutes Tuesday. Pietrus led them with eight first half points, connecting on four of his five field goal attempts.
The Lakers got just three points through three quarters out of sixth-man Lamar Odom coming off 11 and 19-point efforts in Games 1 and 2. He had 11 on the night, but didn’t really make an impact until the fourth quarter.
Defensively neither Pietrus nor starter Courtney Lee has much for Bryant (31 points), but he shot just 11-of-25 and had four turnovers.
As for the rest of the reserves, another player that has been a little lost against L.A. through two games was backup center Marcin Gortat.
His 35 minutes this series backing up Dwight Howard had produced only eight points and six rebounds and two turnovers.
Gortat had only 11 minutes Tuesday with Tony Battie getting some extra minutes and didn’t score. But this time Odom hit a quiet spell, with just three points through three quarters.
Gortat said that he felt like neutralizing Odom was his responsibility the rest of the way.
“I think Lamar Odom is my stuff,” he said. “I have to stop that guy. I’m coming off the bench and have to make an impact and make sure he doesn’t score so much.”
And from the…
]]>And from the neck down, he was fine.
Decked out in a white shirt with his name embroidered across the cuffs, trendy black slacks and stylish black loafers, he looked like the star he had just played like on the basketball court.
But his head couldn’t handle the heat. With sweat pouring down the right side of his face like a waterfall, he was coming unglued.
“M.P., you need a towe
l?” Rashard Lewis laughed, before tossing his teammate a much-needed white cloth that was quickly put to use.Fortunately for the Magic, Pietrus was much cooler on the court than he was in the postgame clubhouse.
In a matchup with the earth’s greatest c
loser, Kobe Bryant, Orlando’s sixth-man actually came out on top. Playing sticky defense on Bryant down the stretch, he helped hold him to five fourth-quarter points on 2 of 6 shooting.That by itself would’ve been plenty for coach Stan Van Gundy. But Pietrus provided a bonus, scoring 10 points in the fourth — more than any other player in the game — to push the Magic to a 108-104 Game 3 victory that added some desired sizzle to these Finals.
But the soft-spoken Pietrus, who finished with 18 points on 7-of-11 shooting and 3 steals, was not about to brag about his play against Kobe.
“I was just a lucky defender,” he said humbly. “I take no credit. You can always give yourself credit, but Thursday, he’s going to come out red-hot, so you can’t be giving yourself too much credit.
“Kobe is tough, tough, tough, tough, tough,” he added, before pausing for dramatic effect. “Tough! Tough! Tough!”
Refusing to provide Kobe with bulletin board material? Nice play. Almost as nice as the plays he made down the stretch Tuesday night.
First came the tip-dunk. With just over two minutes left and the game t
ied at 99, Hedo Turkoglu missed a 14-foot jumper. As the ball began its carom off the rim, you could feel the life leaving Amway Arena.The raucous crowd was sensing the worst — that after shooting an unfathomable 62.5 percent for the game, including 75 percent in the first half, the Magic were about to lose.
But in swooped Pietrus, flying above everyone in purple and gold (and white and blue, for that matter), catching the rock and slamming it through the hoop. It was Orlando’s first basket in more than two minutes.
“We were struggling a little bit, didn’t get a great look at the basket and then he comes in and follows that up,” Van Gundy said. “I thought that was maybe the biggest shot of the game.”
Pietrus said he took a page from Dwight Howard’s book.
“I was trying to show Dwight a little Superman dunk,” he said with a smile. “I was trying to compete against him a little bit.”
Two minutes later, the duo teamed up on what may have been the defensive play of the game. The Magic led 104-102 with a little more than half-a-minute remaining, and everyone in the building, the state and the viewing audience knew the ball was going to Kobe.
“We could feel (that it was going to Kobe),” Pietrus said. “I was talking to Dwight, telling him, ‘we’ve got to be ready for that because at the end of the fourth quarter, it’s going to be all Kobe.”’
Sure enough, the Lakers put the ball in Bryant’s hands and he dribb
led up court while Pau Gasol began getting in place for a high pick-and-roll at the top of the key. The Magic played it perfectly, and the daring Bryant tried to split Howard and Pietrus’ double-team.Howard slapped the ball away from Bryant, but into the hands of Gasol, who was on the floor. Gasol shoveled it to Bryant, who bobbled it and then fouled Pietrus as he scooped it up. Pietrus, just a 70 percent foul shooter in these playoffs, sank both free throws to pretty much seal the win.
Pietrus, who warmed up for his title-round meeting wit
h Bryant by guarding LeBron James in the Eastern Conference finals, gained some inspiration from the arrival of his older brother, Florent Pietrus, who flew to Orlando from Valencia, Spain on Monday. Mickael’s good friend, professional soccer player Claude Makelele, also flew in from Paris.Florent, who at 28 is a year older than Mickael, plays professional basketball in Europe.
“My brother’s never gotten the chance to play in the NBA,” Pietrus said. “So I’m trying to win this for my brother. He’ll be so happy if I win a ring in the NBA.”
Pietrus said he and his brother grew so close because their mother, Coco Claudine, died when they were 9 and 10 years old. Raised by their grandmother on the French Caribbean Island of Guadeloupe, they faced real pressure in everyday life.
Perhaps that’s why the pressure of the postseason hasn’t flustered Pietrus, whose played admirable defense against the world’s two best players and nailed dagger buckets to boot.
“He’s obviously not fazed by this,” Van Gundy said. “And I think that’s a great thing.”
Now if he can just handle the heat of the postgame interviews.
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