MIAMI (AP) - Shaquille O'Neal flopped against Orlando center Dwight Howard. Now he's standing up to Magic coach Stan Van Gundy.
Responding to Van Gundy's reaction about O'Neal's tactics against Howard on Tuesday night, the Phoenix center lashed out at his former coach with the Miami Heat, calling him "a master of panic," a "nobody" and "a frontrunner."
"One thing I really despise is a frontrunner," O'Neal said before the Suns played the Heat, Shaq's first time back in Miami since last season's trade. "I know for a fact he's a master of panic and when it gets time for his team to go into the postseason and do certain things, he will let them down because of his panic. I've been there before. I've played for him."
O'Neal was guarding Howard with about 4 minutes left in the third quarter Tuesday night. Howard made a spin move, O'Neal fell to the court in an effort to get an offensive foul called, and the Magic center easily dunked with two hands.
Afterward, Van Gundy said he was "shocked, seriously. I was shocked and very disappointed because he knows what it's like. You know, let's stand up and play like men, and I think our guy did that."
"Note this," Van Gundy said. "It's not often that I will needle Shaq, because he's a big guy and he played for me and helped me win a lot of games. But he always talks about people flopping. Only one big guy tried to flop tonight. He tried to flop. So ask him about that. I told him something on the sideline. I said, 'C'mon now, all the griping you do about flopping and you're trying to take a flop."'
O'Neal said he admitted to Van Gundy in that conversation that it was a flop.
But it was the postgame comments that truly seemed to raise Shaq's ire.
"I'm not going to sit around and let nobodies take shots at me," O'Neal said. "He is a nobody to me. If he thinks he can get a little press conference and take shots at me like I'm not take one back, he has another thing coming. ... I tried to take a charge. The rules say when a guy comes into your chest and you fall, it's an offensive foul. That's all I tried to do. I fell. I didn't complain."
The relationship between Van Gundy and O'Neal has seemed to be slippery at best for years.
O'Neal came to Miami for the 2004-05 season, helped the Heat win 59 games that season alongside Dwyane Wade and with Van Gundy on the sideline. But that season ended with the loss to the Pistons, a game where Miami wasted a six-point lead over the final 7 minutes and afterward O'Neal said he didn't get the ball enough.
He also added that night, "I'll take the blame. I always do."
Van Gundy resigned 21 games into the next season, Pat Riley took over once again and the Heat won a championship, O'Neal's fourth title.
Author: Fox Sports
Author's Website: http://www.foxsports.com
Added: March 5, 2009
