| ONE-ON-ONE: Zoran Planinic |
By Philip Maymin
Zoran Planinic of the New Jersey Nets is in the simultaneously enviable and unenviable position of playing behind All-World point guard Jason Kidd. On the one hand, being a rookie and learning from the best can only be a plus. On the other hand, you're not going to see much playing time.
So Zoran has become remarkably efficient in optimizing his minutes. One of the things that has helped him has been new head coach Lawrence Frank's decision to call the plays for him, so that Zoran can instead concentrate on initiating the offense. Because the team's bench is in front of its own offense for the first half of the game, that's when Zoran has been seeing most of his minutes.
Zoran took a few minutes to talk about playing behind Jason Kidd, and tonight's victory over the Atlanta Hawks, who were sporting a new power forward in Rasheed Wallace.
You've been playing most of your minutes in the first half because it helps you out when the coach calls the plays. Do you feel that you'll eventually start playing in the second halves of games?
I hope so, I hope so, I mean I feel I'm ready.
You had seven points in eight minutes tonight.
Yeah, I'm ready, but I need to improve myself, you know, If I play like I played today every game, the coach is going to have have trust in me, so it's going to be easier.
Which positions do you like to play, one, two, or three?
One. I like the one.
So it's hard to get playing time behind Jason Kidd.
You said it all. He's the best point guard in the world. It would be stupid of me to ask to play 20 minutes. What I have is that every game I learn from him, every game I watch him, and every game he does something unbelievable, so it's fun.
What areas of the game would you most want to improve right now?
We are a transition team so when I go in a game, I want it to stay like that.
Push the ball?
Yeah, push the ball a little bit better.
So defensively, rebounding, you feel you're doing okay?
You always need to improve yourself defensively.
How do you feel about the new Atlanta team you just faced, relative to your expectations?
Man, they're really good. Now, when they have Rasheed, they move the ball so much quicker, and they've got a shooter in the post, so they're dangerous, especially with [Jason] Terry and Stephen Jackson, they're a dangerous team.
Were you surprised by the number of threes they took?
Yeah, because we played them in Atlanta, and they were not a shooting team. Now, they're dangerous now.
Did something change in the defensive lineups that got them so many more open looks, or do you feel it's just a lot of concentration on Rasheed?
Oh, when you got Rasheed, man, you must always help, so the guys can shoot. I think they play with a lot more confidence. My man Boris Diaw, he needs to be more aggressive and drive more when he has the ball.
Used courtesy of: HOOPSWORLD.com |
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