Nick Nurse on ejection: ‘You can only take so much’

Toronto Raptors head coach Nick Nurse was tossed from Thursday’s game against the Detroit Pistons, but still spoke to the media after the loss. He explained what led to his ejection, how he thought his team played without him down the stretch, and talked about some of the issues with coach’s challenges.

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Video Transcript

NICK NURSE: I mean, you know, again, we stole the ball a couple of times clean in the first half. And I had to burn timeouts-- I had to run the timeout to challenge one. Stole one right before that clean. Blocked the shot there clean. I mean, you can only take so much.

- [INAUDIBLE] that's in the fourth quarter of-- you obviously [INAUDIBLE] back by that, but it was a sort of pressing defensive group out there. So your shooter, or your most offensive-oriented players maybe is not the team-- [LAUGHS] it's not how you--

NICK NURSE: Who would you have rather seen in there?

- Yeah, no, no. Got your attention. Felt like it-- it seems like you want to pass and create [INAUDIBLE].

NICK NURSE: Well, I mean, of course I don't know-- I mean, they were up the floor, and they were playing hard. I thought even in the halfcourt, we were causing [INAUDIBLE]. And that group was obviously playing really well together. I think that was probably what the coaching staff was seeing. I think they did an excellent job.

Obviously, that got us right back in the game. And we missed a couple of layups there to tie it, and we missed one free throw that could have tied it too. And, you know, as you guys-- a lot of times in a close game, the guys getting balls got to bounce your way.

I mean, I was watching it on TV. We had one possession where we deflected three times in the same possession. They end up with a jump contested that went in. And then we had another blocked shot that ended up in another jump shot that went in.

And then the last bucket he made was pretty much a circus. It's a heck of a move by him, but he made it dipsy-do with three guys surrounding him. So it just didn't bounce our way much tonight. But at least we were knocking it away a little bit there late to try to make it bounce our way.

- What did you think of those possessions down the stretch where Precious ended up on Cade? There's that one, especially, where he was really looking to get up in his face [INAUDIBLE]

NICK NURSE: Yeah, I mean, I think, again late, they were having a tough time getting too much. We were taking them deep in the shot clock, and they were having to try to create something. And I thought we were guarding pretty good one-on-one, Precious, Chris, we're all getting in those situations.

I thought Grant took it into the paint a few times, and we really made those tough on him, much tougher than we made it throughout the course of the game. So yeah, they were pretty switched-on again. I thought they probably did enough defensively to get them the win with all the deflections and blocks and stuff. But again, it didn't quite bounce our way.

- I will go with one question online. Go ahead, Aaron.

- Hey, Nick. Just a question for you about coaches' challenges. Can you think of a reason, I guess other than elongating the game, why coaches should not keep their challenge if they win? Would you like to see that change?

NICK NURSE: Well, there's some, like-- I don't know if you noticed tonight. I mean, I took that one. It was a second clean steal we had in three possessions. It was Pascal's third. But you know, it put me in a huge bind timeout-wise. Left me three for the game.

So [LAUGHS] I lose my timeout on it is because it falls within the mandatory window. and it's a jump ball on top of it. But it saves Pascal a foul. Doesn't seem to quite add up.

- --to see more of an NFL-style rule?

NICK NURSE: Well, I don't really know what I'd like to see. But I think if you win the challenge regardless, you shouldn't lose your timeout, regardless--

- Thanks, Nick.

NICK NURSE: --what situation you're in.

- Thanks very much.

- Reminded me of something. Did you get an explanation for why, when Casey made the coaches [INAUDIBLE], it wasn't a jump ball?

NICK NURSE: I did. And he hadn't blown his whistle till they had recovered the ball.

- OK.

NICK NURSE: There's probably something we should look into, their--