Intro:

Reaction from Doc Rivers and Blake Griffin of the Los Angeles Clippers and Kevin McHale of the Houston Rockets after the Clippers beat the Rockets 117-101 in Game 1 of the Western Conference semi-finals on Monday (4th May) at the Toyota Center in Houston, Texas.

Script:

SOUNDBITE (English) Doc Rivers, Los Angeles Clippers Head Coach:

"One of the things we told all the guards today is to be aggressive scorers and let Blake (Griffin) be the facilitator. I thought we did that after we had the turnoverfest in the first half. And I was just really proud of our guys. They hung in there because that first half could have got away from us. And the fact that we were able to kind of keep our composure, turn the ball over that many times and only down four (points) I think, I thought that was the turning point. And Blake (Griffin) was just, he was sensational, you know."

SOUNDBITE (English) Kevin McHale, Houston Rockets Head Coach:

Client Note+++STRONG LANGUAGE USED+++

"It looked and felt like a half a step slower the whole game. It looked like we were reacting to everything they were doing and we were not proactive whatsoever. Started off the game trying to go inside and just turning, you know, having layups and then turning around and throwing the ball to them without shooting a layup. They played better then we did. We have to play much better than that. That was not the effort, forget everything else, just the effort level has got to be better. Days off are no excuse. There's no excuses. I mean you either get the thing done or you don't get it done. We didn't get it done. They kicked our ass. That's the bottom line."

SOUNDBITE (English) Blake Griffin, Los Angeles Clippers Forward:

"Yeah, I mean without Chris (Los Angeles Clippers Guard Chris Paul) everybody has to step up. But it's not one person's job it's all of our jobs. And I think if you look at the stat sheet and look how we played tonight, it was everybody."