Jazz coach Jerry Sloan doesn't think that his team is "nasty" enough to compete with a team like the Lakers.
Los Angeles defeated Utah 113-100 in Game 1 of their first-round series on Sunday.
"We're not a nasty team," Sloan said.
"You know, most of the teams that we've had (previously in Utah) have been pretty nasty — and they will get after you from daylight until dark. We're just learning how to get after it a little bit more as we go along with younger guys.
"And part of that's my fault," he added. "I take full responsibility for that, because I haven't been, probably, nasty enough with them."
Lakers guard Kobe Bryant agreed with Sloan, while also praising his opponent's history.
"I'm a game connoisseur, so I know how nasty Sloan was when he was playing. Pardon my French, but your a-- would get kicked out of the league if you played that physical nowadays," Bryant said following Game 1. "But it's always a staple of his teams to be physical and to play hard — and Utah, the team now's no different. I think he'll use it as a motivational tool to get his team to play harder."
The label of a soft team on Raps has been sticking on them since day one.
The only toughness Raps ever had was when they had Oakley and later Garbajosa on the team.
The fact that both Triano (who is supposed to push the players) and CB4 (team leader who is supposed to lead by example) are nice guy does not help either...
