'It was needed': Chris Boucher on Nick Nurse calling him out

On the latest episode of "Hustle Play with Chris Boucher," Boucher explains what he likes about having Nick Nurse as a coach and the importance of executing the Raptors' defence. Listen to the full episode on the podcast feed or watch on our YouTube channel.

Video Transcript

- There were some reports that Nick Nurse had some one-on-one meetings with everyone.

CHRIS BOUCHER: Yeah. It was needed.

- I understand that. Nick Nurse seems like a pretty straight-up guy.

CHRIS BOUCHER: Yeah.

- He's going to tell you the truth.

CHRIS BOUCHER: For sure.

- Your relationship with him, and the way that he gives his message to, not just the team, but guys individually, what have you learned from him the most?

CHRIS BOUCHER: Oh, it's coming. You know, obviously, if you don't play well, it's coming, and you're going to hear about it. So the one thing I've noticed and I've realized the most about it, is that you have to expect it if you're not playing the right way, because you've shown so many times that you could play, how you could play. So if it's expected for you to play a certain way, and you haven't for a minute, you've got to expect somebody or something to come out eventually out of it.

And eventually-- You could duck a couple, two games, one, two, games not playing well. It's normal. But when it becomes like a routine and, you know, it's just not what it is, sometimes you need your coach to tell you something so you can wake up, because obviously he's acknowledging that you're not playing well, which is good, because if he doesn't acknowledge that you're playing well and you just go to somebody else, that means he doesn't care. And if he doesn't care then you might as well just stop playing, because if he started, if he brings you up and you realize that you're not playing well, it's because he knows what you could do, and you need to do better.

And that's something that I fought for a long time, but I realized that every coach I had been doing that to me, just making me-- They know what I could do because I showed it a bunch of times. And the minute that I don't do it, it's visible, because you can see what I do when I'm playing really well, and you can see when I'm not playing well. So--

- What is something about Nick Nurse that you guys get to see up close, like the team, but a lot of fans wouldn't know about him?

CHRIS BOUCHER: I think the one thing that-- I mean, obviously, most people know, like they think that he-- obviously, like, everything is structured and all that. But a lot of things that he brings in his coaching and whatever are stuff that he's seen, probably, like, a couple of games before, maybe a year or two years before, and it's all a mix of everything that he's been through.

And I think that's something that really makes him a different coach, because, like, at the end of the day, we're playing so many defense and so many [INAUDIBLE] that stuff, all the schemes and stuff, and that comes from all the backgrounds and other games that he played. There's not a lot of teams that are doing what we're doing right now, press, 12, this, this, that, pressing here, pressing there, double here, double there, one-on-one here, one-on-one on one side. Like, we're doing a lot of different stuff, and yeah, that just comes from all the experience that he has.

- You guys have some crazy schemes, offensive and defensive. Like, typically in the NBA, you don't see all these different kind of offensive and defensive schemes.

CHRIS BOUCHER: For sure.

- Beneficial, you believe, because a lot of coaches are-- Would you say they're afraid to try different defensive and offensive schemes, like, that you would see in college?

CHRIS BOUCHER: No. I think it's beneficial when you do it right. That's the one thing, is when you do it right, it looks really nice. Like, you could watch us play for, like, 10, 20, possession, and you're like, wow, like, this guy goes over here, this guy's help here, here, here. And it's like, wow. And then after that, you could watch us play for 10 position, where nobody's doing what they're supposed to do. An easy switch, we don't do it, and then now it's all messed up because now we're in rotations. And that's what kills us, is that if you mess up there, somebody has to fix it. And if somebody fix it, somebody has to fix that one, and it's a domino effect.