Rose on ankle sprain: ‘No excuses. It’s the playoffs’

INDIANAPOLIS -- Derrick Rose had a simple cure for treating a sprained ankle.

“The best thing to do,” he said, “is tie up your shoes tight and just keep playing.”

Rose injured the ankle while pushing off to make a layup with 1:14 to play in the first quarter.

“I took off wrong and all my weight pushed over on the ankle and I ended up twisting it,” he said.

He limped to the locker room but returned to the floor after missing less than three minutes of game action.

“That’s basketball,” he said. “You’re going to have injuries. I just wanted to keep moving.”

Rose missed 16 of 22 from the field but said: “No excuses. It’s the playoffs and I’ve sprained my ankle a million times. I just wasn’t able to hit shots.

“All my shots were on target but they were just short. Next time, just shoot the ball up and shoot with my legs.”

Rose said he feels good and said the injury, according to X-rays, is a “sprain. If it was anything bigger than that, they would’ve told me.”