Oklahoma City Thunder: Serge Ibaka speaks - NewsOK.com (blog)

on June 2, 2012M at 2:45 pm

Serge Ibaka chatted with the media after practice Friday, and most of the time, Serge is a rather quiet member of the Thunder. He’s not interviewed a lot, because of the language barrier and because he’s not a great quote in any language. But I thought Serge was more insightful than usual, talking about the Thunder’s defensive effort in a 102-82 rout of the Spurs in Game 3. So here’s the interview:

How good was the pick’n roll defense last night?

Ibaka: “Oh man, last night we were trying to do a better job after the first two games in San Antonio. Be aggressiver.

Did you enjoy guarding Manu Ginobili?

Ibaka: “Yes sir, I enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. I think it’s good for us. They play good, like a team. They screen. It’s kind of hard, but when you switch, one-on-one, it’s hard to stay. But it’s what you got to do.

What did you do to Manu?

Ibaka: “Be ready to contest his 3-point shot and make him drive to his right and be aggressive. Just be ready to move your feet and contest the shot.”

What was the attitude in practice?

Ibaka: “We got our confidence back. It was very important for us to get a win last night. Now we have our confidence back.”

Does it help that you guys are younger?

Ibaka: “It’s just basketball. It’s not about age or young. It’s basketball. First two games in San Antonio, they played great. Now it’s time to get back and play our basketball.”

You guys have done a really good job guarding Tim Duncan.

Ibaka: “We know he’ll come back and be more aggressive. We have Perk, he’s doing a great job on Duncan in the post.”

So there you go. My favorite comments: 1. Serge admitting he enjoyed the challenge of switching onto Ginobili; 2. Admitting that you have to make Ginobili go to his right (sort of the same way opponents always are trying to make James Harden go to his right); 3. You couldn’t really tell by the quotes, but you could tell with his voice, Serge didn’t like the question about age. I think the Thunder is tired of the storyline, pro or con, that they either should win because of young legs or should lose because of lack of experience.

-------------Berry Tramel can be heard Monday through Friday from 4:40-5:20 p.m. on The Sports Animal radio network, including AM-640 and FM-98.1. You can e-mail him here and follow him on Twitter @BerryTramel. Visit Berry's website here.

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