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Playing in the playoffs is the best basketball in the world, and if you can learn under that pressure, succeed under that pressure, it gives you more confidence the next year.

One thing about championship teams is that they're resilient. No matter what is thrown at them, no matter how deep the hole, they find a way to bounce back and overcome adversity.

We have to get better at that. All of the Stanley Cup winning teams throughout the past few seasons, when they needed to play defense, they did it. If you can play defense, that's when you know it's game over.

I think that's part of building your team is trying to anticipate where your team is going and to a certain extent where, especially defensively because you have to react to what they put on the field. Defensively you have to be able to defend those things.

I learned from Chuck Noll in Pittsburgh that speed and explosiveness on defense is the way to build a team. Both are difficult for your opponent to assimilate in practice and then in games it is even harder to match.

Obviously, not playing a game before playoffs is something that happened, but especially going into the playoffs, you try to feel yourself out, where you're at, and then get right into game tempo and jump right in and play where you were before the injury.

Defensive backs are the best players on the field. But when you get an exceptional player like a Deion Sanders or a Darrell Green - these guys are fast and they have very good technique. You have to work a little harder.

It takes the pressure off of your better players to know they don't always have to be on top of their game for the team to do well.