88 Playoff Games Quotes
Following is our list of playoff games quotations and slogans full of insightful wisdom and perspective about postseason.
Quick Jump To
Famous Playoff Games Quotes
This is why you play - to get an opportunity to play in the playoffs. — Derek Jeter
That's what you work all season for, to get into the playoff games, and you don't want to blow it. — Ray Nitschke
I don't just think regular season. I think playoffs. World Series. That's how I think. — Mariano Rivera
I don't want to just go to the playoffs, I don't want to go to the playoffs and win the first round, second round, and not win the whole thing because it's bittersweet. — Allen Iverson
Pro football is a game; not a war. It's for win or lose, not life or death... but say that in the summer, for winter brings the playoffs, and a season is at stake. — John Facenda
I've got a Championship game to play and I'm excited about the opportunity of my damn strong football team to play in it. — Les Miles
Coaches win practices, players win games — Pete Carril
If it's the ultimate game, how come they're playing it again next year? — Duane Thomas
You don't just be a team. You become a team. Through tough games you find that you need each other — Mike Krzyzewski
Win, lose, or tie, you're gonna play like champions! — Herb Brooks
I'd rather be a non-All-Star playing in the Western Conference finals than an All-Star who's sitting at home in May. — Stephen Curry
If it weren't for a new rule that came into being, we'd have played three years in a row in the championship game. — Al Davis
To win the big games you must get to the Free Throw line, and then you must make them. — Rick Majerus
People play games seriously. People host tournaments. People watch other people play. — Jensen Huang
You're all playin' for second place. — Larry Bird
Short Playoff Games Quotes
- Most ball games are lost, not won. — Casey Stengel
- Play hard, play smart, play together, have fun. — Morgan Wootten
- Individuals play the game, but teams win championships. — Unknown
- When you're playing against a stacked deck, compete even harder. — Pat Riley
- I just keep thinking about putting up good numbers, playing hard and winning games. — Mike Trout
- You play, you win, you play, you lose. You play. — Jeanette Winter
- There are a lot more TV sets in use on Monday night than on Sunday afternoon. — Pete Rozelle
- I'm with Houston now. I just have to come in here and play hard and win games. — James Harden
- We must play as if there are no more games, no more tomorrows. — Jock Stein
- Championships and great seasons are won in locker rooms. — Tom Izzo
Playoff Quotes
My dream was to be in the NBA. I wasn't really focused on being a star player on a team. I just wanted to make it to the NBA. I've been blessed for the opportunities to be in the Finals, been in the playoffs ever since I've been in the NBA. — James Harden
The game against the Vikings back in my second year stands out. It was kind of a turnaround for us. It allowed us to make a run at the playoffs for the first time in quite a while. The memories are so many it's hard to pin one down. — Drew Bledsoe
The excitement of the fans in Montreal, especially in the playoffs, I don't think you can get that anywhere else. For a hockey player, I kind of wish everyone could go through that and experience what it is to play there. It's very unique. — Saku Koivu
I played in Joe Louis in a playoff game. I played there when the roof caved in for half a season. The facility is great for basketball because it goes straight up, so you feel like the fans are on top of you. — Bill Laimbeer
You don't win games as a coach during games. You win games as a coach before games. Players win during games, not coaches — Red Auerbach
I want my team to be more detached from the wins and losses and be more focused on doing the little things well. When you focus on getting the win, it can suffocate you, especially during the playoffs when the pressure gets thick. — Sue Enquist
We literally had all 10 teams alive for a playoff position in the final week of the season. That outstanding balance and those close races created a major surge in attendance in the last month of the season. — Lamar Hunt
A-Rod wants to be like Babe Ruth. And people don't realize this, he's a lot like Babe Ruth. Before the playoffs a couple of years ago, A-Rod went to the hospital and promised a dying kid he'd ground out to second for him. — Artie Lange
You always want to feel better but I'm good. My thing is once you get to the playoffs, you do whatever it takes. You've got to lay it on the line. — Brian Jordan
The playoffs are the playoffs. You just play who is put in front of you. — Steve Nash
Postseason Quotes
Winning a postseason game is like winning five regular season games. There is just no feeling like it. Everything is magnified. Every free throw, turnover, shot and play. — Don Meyer
The regular season is where you make your name, but the postseason is where you make your fame — Walt Frazier
Everybody's going to be clamoring, that's the way you should work your bullpens from now on, but you have to have the appropriate people to do that, and of course during the season it would be much more difficult as opposed to the microcosm of the postseason. — Joe Maddon
I'd like to get back and win the World Series and have that be the last image in my mind for the postseason. — Brad Lidge
I don't have anything to prove at all. I've pitched in a lot of games. I've had far more good games than bad games in the postseason. I know that some people may not remember that, for whatever reason. — Brad Lidge
We're not even thinking about (the postseason) right now. We've been in a slump, so we're taking things day by day. We aren't looking to the future because we haven't addressed the present. — Cartier Martin
I was in the postseason twice and I'm thankful for that. — Ryne Sandberg
Your teammates give you the confidence. They give me the confidence all year, all postseason. — LeBron James
I was so used to going out and winning state championships and playing in the postseason. — LeBron James
My first postseason home run was a walk-off in the Division Series. That was just a special moment in my career. — Mark Teixeira
People Writing About Playoff Games
| Name | Quotes | Likes |
|---|---|---|
 Derek Jeter |
80 | 799 |
 Mariano Rivera |
43 | 173 |
 Allen Iverson |
76 | 1228 |
 Les Miles |
38 | 513 |
 Pete Carril |
23 | 159 |
 Mike Krzyzewski |
168 | 999 |
More Playoff Games Quotes
The goal every year is to win the Super Bowl, not just to get to the playoffs, not just to win a few games. — Calvin Johnson
You've got to enjoy time with your family and friends, and if you're involved in sports franchises, those peak moments in playoff games. You have to enjoy life. — Paul Allen
Experience is everything. It means so much because it enabled me to learn the game even faster. 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. — Tony Parker
We're beating a lot of poor teams. So what? We won a lot of games last year, too. Will Horace and Bill still be playing at this level in the playoffs...Can Pip keep it up? — Michael Jordan
By the age of 18, the average American has witnessed 200,000 acts of violence on television, most of them occurring during Game 1 of an NHL playoff series. — Steve Rushin
Westbrook: 10 triple-doubles and carrying that team, injury-prone, into the playoffs. LeBron being the best player in the world. But I think right now I would go with James Harden because of what he's done. He's stepped up his game defensively. He's not a great defender but he's competing on the defensive end. — Mark Jackson
In this millennium that we live in, the 'Hack-a-Shaq'has proven not to work. It might work a couple games every now and then, but when it comes to the playoffs or a championship series, it doesn't work - not at all. — Shaquille O'Neal
It’s not a playoff game, it’s like the Super Bowl. … This is going to be a blood bath out there. I know they’re going to be ready to play. This is going to be a physical game. I’m sure that I’m going to be ready and I know my boys are going to be ready to back it up. — Jason Pierre-Paul
When people come up to me and say, "I was at your Game 7 in the playoffs in Toronto," or, "I saw your first goal in the NHL," that triggers memories. But I don't sit around my kitchen table and tell my kids, "You know, one year I got 92 goals." — Wayne Gretzky
Americans have become conditioned to believe the world is a gray place without absolutes; this is because we're simultaneously both cowardly and arrogant. We don't know the answers, so we assume they must not exist. — Chuck Klosterman
I don't remember those early playoff games. Keep it positive. I'm a different player. More focused. I know how important it is to score in the playoffs. — Pavel Datsyuk
I love our fans. Our fans are so supportive. It's been incredible to end four playoff games with 'Go Pack Go.' It's great at home, they travel well, it's on a first-name basis. It's a special play to play and all of us are blessed to play in Green Bay, and hopefully we will be repaying those fans with the Lombardi trophy. — Aaron Rodgers
Life is like a game, Charlie Brown... Sometimes you win... Sometimes you lose." "I'll be happy if I just make the playoffs. — Charles M. Schulz
We had an opportunity to clinch a playoff berth and I think if that's not enough motivation I don't think you should be playing this game. — Tina Thompson
Coach [Pat] Riley's record speaks for itself. What makes him so special is he is a coach clearly concerned about winning. His whole thinking when he wakes up every day is how can I make this team [ New York Knicks] more focused and going through 82 games during the regular season and the playoffs. — John Starks
You don't realize how long that NFL season is. It's a long season, especially in your first year. Not only do you spend a lot of time preparing for the draft and working out, but they you have OTAs, minicamps, training camp, preseason games. By the time you get to week six you've already had one of the longest years of your football life and you still have 11 weeks to go, plus the playoffs. — Giovani Bernard
It's just like high school. If you're a freshman or a sophomore, it's hard to tell the seniors who've been through two, three, playoff games what to do. — Tony Romo
To me, it's like we're already in the playoffs. Every game is important for our position. We can't relax at all. — Peter Bondra
I've been on teams that lost a hundred games in a season. I've been on teams that had a shot to make the playoffs and fizzled out at the end. — Chili Davis
We have a lot of rookies in the lineup. More than anybody, I would say. Its going to be something new for them.They have to understand that it's totally different hockey in the playoffs. Starting with the fans, the intensity of the game, every mistake counts. — Jaromir Jagr
I'm not going to fight because I mean too much to our team, and I can't afford to be suspended for a game or do something stupid to get me kicked out of a playoff game. — LeBron James
I knew nothing about hockey when I came to Chicago and then became the biggest fan - went to every playoff game. — Christian Madsen
[Spike Lee ] went to a game six playoff game at Indiana which was a hostile environment believing we could bring it back to New York for a game seven. That's just the kind of person he is. Also his commitment to the team and our friendship. — John Starks
At halftime [of Game 7], one of our oldest guys on the team, James Jones, came to me, and he's like, "Man, it's time for you to do something. You've been sleeping the whole playoffs, the whole final series." First couple of shots I got coming out, I was like, "You know what, I'm gonna shoot it." Fortunately they fell, and we started making our way back. — J. R. Smith
I think your goal is to win every single game you play. ... I'm not a guy that just puts a number on it and says we're going to do this, or makes a bravado statement like, "We're going to the playoffs and I guarantee it." I'm not a guy that talks about what we're going to do. I'm just, "Let's do it." And what it is is, we need to work extremely hard. — Chip Kelly
The NHL is the best league in the world, but it's a grind. You sometimes forget, especially if you are losing, or missing the playoffs ... how fun this game can be. — Thomas Vanek
You want to be the guy who makes an impact in every game. In this sport it's all about results-winning games and making the playoffs. — Martin St. Louis
Every team in the NFL is hard, but when we play our own division it's a fight. Our goal is to make it to the playoffs and to do that we have to win games within the division. We match up well against this division, it's just a matter of getting on the field and doing what we know we can do. — Giovani Bernard
You've got to be in the moment, especially in the playoffs. If you're worried about the past, worried about what happened last game, that's a lost cause. — Drew Storen
There were a lot of big games. But I think one of the biggest was one that will go down as one of the biggest upsets in playoff history. We were 15-point underdogs going into Miami and upset them. That was a big one. — Chuck Knox
Andrew Luck, if he gets to his first Super Bowl and he wins that Super Bowl, that means he won on the road every game except for that first playoff game. He went and beat Peyton Manning…Then that means he went and beat Tom Brady…Then he would either have to beat Aaron Rodgers or the Seattle Seahawks. That’s a pretty tough hill to climb. If he does that, he’s just solidified himself in that conversation as an elite quarterback. — Charles Woodson
I live for the Red Sox. I thoroughly enjoy them. For whatever reason, baseball has been a lot more fun for me in recent years. I loosely follow the Patriots and I root for them. I loosely follow the Celtics and then it gets to playoff time and I don't miss a game. Same with the Bruins. I'm not the diehard fan anymore. — Doug Flutie
Commenting on playoffs to determine a national champion: I'm not in favor of 15 games either. I think that's way too much football. The thing that I feel good about is that these guys hung together through 15 games and played hard every week. That's a marvelous tribute to the kids. We just hung in there today and kept playing. It's just been a special feeling all year long. — LaVell Edwards
The best part of basketball, for those people on the inside, is the bus going to the airport after you've won a game on an opponent's floor. It's been a very tough battle. And preferably, in the playoffs. And that feeling that you have, together as a group, having gone to an opponent's floor and won a very good victory, is as about as high as you can get. — Phil Jackson
As an organization, would we like to be in a better spot Everybody would like to know they're in the playoffs. But that's not a reality, year after year being in a playoff spot with 10, 12, 15 games left. We don't have that this year, so our playoffs have started. — John Tortorella
Pressure? Well it ain't hitting in forty-four straight games, because I done that and it was fun. The playoffs are pressure. — Pete Rose
We are a terrible defensive team right now. We're not putting forth the maximum effort that we need to put forth, especially in our position. You'd think that we'd put forth that maximum effort to not only win the game, but to get a good rhythm to get into the playoffs. — Jermaine O'Neal
What I meant by that is, any time you have adversity, now you've got a chance to see all of these guys play every game the rest of the way like it's a playoff game. What you want guys to do when there's adversity is to play harder and play better, and that's when you see what kind of guys you have in your locker room. — Mike Shanahan
In Conclusion
Which quotation resonated with you best? Did you enjoy our collection of playoff games quotes? Or may be you have a slogan about playoff games to suggest. Let us know using our contact form.
Citation
Feel free to cite and use any of the quotes in this collection of playoff games quotations. For popular citation styles(APA, Chicago, MLA), please use this citation page.
Embed HTML Link
Copy and paste this HTML code in your webpage