Hoops Tonight - Film Breakdown: How Steph Curry picked apart Rockets defense in Warriors game 1 win

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Everybody up all if you guys are having a great start to here week, we are going to do a little bit of a deep dive into last night's game one between the Houston Rockets in the Golden State Warriors. Off the top, I'm going to go through some of the metrics that came out of that game, some super interesting ones that demonstrate the clear skill gap between the

two teams. And then down the stretch, we're going to go through about thirty five clips worth of film from that game to demonstrate some of the concepts that I was talking about in the series preview as well as during the show last night. You guys know the Joe before we get started. Subscribed to the Hoops and Night YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore json lt so you guys don't misshow announcements. Don't forget about our podcast feed

wherever you get your podcast on our Hoops Tonight. It's also super helpful if you leave a rating in a review on that front. Jackson's doing great work on our social media feeds Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. Make sure you guys follow us there. In the last but not least, keep dropping mail bag questions in the YouTube comments. We keep getting to them throughout the remainder of the season. All right, let's talk some basketball. So I'm just going to off the top here. List off some of the

some of the stats that came out of last night's game. So, first of all, per cleaning the glass, the gap in half court offense. Last night between the Warriors and the Rockets, the Rockets logged a sixty five point five offensive rating in the half court versus the Warriors.

make up some ground. Houston won the offensive rebounding battle twenty two to six, as we saw, but Golden State did do a better job of converting those offensive rebounds into points. The actual second chance points battle was twenty two to twelve instead of twenty two to six in offensive rebound meaning Houston was getting one point per second possession while Golden State was getting two points per second possession.

That allowed them to shrink that gap as well. Did we only saw four possessions of zone for both teams. Both teams really struggled. Golden State scored just once in four possessions against zone. Houston scored zero times in four possessions against zone. My guess is we see a lot more zone for both teams over the course of the series. Rescue shot making Synergy classifies this as any shot that goes up in the last four seconds of the shot clock.

Golden State got one point two eight points per shot in the final seconds of the shot clock. Houston got zero point four to six. Now that's those steph prayers over Jalen Green or over Then Thompson from thirty five feet on the light, the out by half court, or Jimmy Butler sidestep jump shots. The Golden State Warriors are just so much better at tough show making that in those late clock sequences. I expect them throughout the series to convert more of those into points than Houston is

going to be able to. We saw a massive gap there. Out of bounds plays Golden State one point sixty four points per possession, Houston zero point eighty six. Overall jump shooting forty six jump shots for Golden State one point one to three points per shot, forty four jump shots for Houston zero point sixty four points per shot. So like there is just a massive skill and execution gap between these two teams that was on display and was

clearly showing in the numbers. But on that note, let's get into some of the things that I noticed on film during the game during my rewatch this morning. So one of the things I talked about was the idea that as you can see here, as we start on the screen, Shanggon is on Moses Moody, And because Shangun is on Moses Moody, it makes it so that some

of these pet actions are more switchable for the Rockets. Right, So as you can see, Fred van Vliet was on Draymond, Dylan Brooks was on Jimmy Butler, they're now switching this off ball screen. You have a Men Thompson on Steph. So the classic Steph Draymond pick and roll, that's just gonna be a switch. It's just gonna end with Dylan Brooks on Steph and with the men Thompson on Draymond Green any sort of three man action, they're gonna switch

wide pin down Draymon and Jimmy. They're going to switch it shuts down their primary screening actions, and so what I was curious about is how Golden State would look to attack that. And one of the things I talked about last night was they did a lot of work to try to get Jalen Green onto Steph before attacking shanng Gooon. In a screening action very first possession of the game, you see a perfect example of it. We go to Jimmy Butler up up here, we have Steph

with the men Thompson POD's with Jalen Green. Moses Moody is getting ready to set this like a screen over here. Wide as we see, there's an interchange with Stephan Pods Pods cuts through that gets Jalen Green onto Steph. Then they set the screen with Moody. Moody makes good contact and step gets a pretty clean look coming off the screen. You'll see a lot of examples of that in the film of the warriors going out of their way to go at Jalen Green in screening actions. This was the.

going towards the middle of the floor. But what just about every team in the NBA will do is they'll ask this guy to massively overplay the middle side and funnel him back towards the sideline, and then they'll sit there big in a drop coverage, essentially trying to force Jalen Green to drive into this gap and take some sort of stupid mid range jump shot. And then the ideally you would sync in with these guys to help

on the roll. They didn't sink in very well. Jalen Green just drives into that gap, creates an easy pocket feed to Shangun Pods isn't in there, step isn't in there, and then we just get the body bag on Dream. That was just an insane dunk from Alpern Shangoon. This is another example of attacking Jalen Green in screening action. So we have a Men Thompson on steph. We have Jalen Green defending pods. As they set that screen, Jalen Green jumps up. Notice the screening angle from pods. Pods

is not actually trying to screen a men Thompson. All he's trying to do is trigger the switch and he wants inside position. He doesn't want a men Thompson to be able to loop back around to get behind him, and so he screens on the backside so that when the switch happens, there's this obvious lane there for pods to sink into.

the mid range. This is what we see from like you know, Isaiah Hartenstein and a bunch of guys that can shoot these like little short pop shots. Draymond's sinking down Dylan Brooks on Steph. Well, here's Shanggun just hanging out by the foul line where he can just shoot a little shot to space the floor. Identical action to the first possession of the game for Golden State. Once again, we have the setup right, We have pods with Jalen Green, we have Steph with him and Thompson. We have Moses

Moody getting ready to set the actual screen. Right, So here we go. We get our first screening action with these two. Notice Draymond's the fulcrum instead of Jimmy like he was early. We get the first screen to get the switch. Now STEP's on, uh has Jalen Green on him? Look at Shangoon, He's sitting in help He's not ready. Moses Moody's that's a good pick. And so you're attacking the two weakest defenders on the floor for Houston. This is a very good look for Steph. Just happens to

miss it. He missed some of the easy ones early, but these are I've always said this is how you get your rhythm. There were a lot of easy looks for Steph early in the game that allowed him to get his rhythm, which then he got his confidence, got into his groove, and just started cooking the rockets with tough shot making as the game progressed. Here's another example

of shanguon mid range spacing. Let's fast forward a little bit so as you can see once again, a men Thompson's driving, Draymond's sinking down, Shangun's just kind of hanging around eight feet from the basket shoots that little short range jump shot. It's a nice way for Shangun to be able to space the floor there. Now Shangun's gonna try to go at Steph in an inverted ball screen in the middle of the floor. Notice he immediately dives down and stabs at the basketball. That disrupts his rhythm.

He's now broken Shangun's rhythm here gets the ball back though, backs down the physicality disrupting the base probably fouls him here. I mean this is a valley basically like slow and right on right on the forearmers. He's shooting the hook. But again, it's playoff basketball. There's fouls that occur on just about every possession. You need to bring the physicality and force the refs to make a call, especially in

a seize mismatch like this. Refs are generally gonna let you get away with a lot of physicality when you are the guy that has a size and strength disadvantage. Then on this miss we get a transition cross match, and this how you can use the chaos from transitions cross matches to create offense. So in the push, notice Moody is now being guarded by Jalen Green, which means Shanggoon is guarding Gary Payton. The Warriors immediately identify it.

Steph hasn't even crossed half court yet. It's fuck everything else. We're just gonna run a high ball screen. Why because they're like Gary Payton is one of their guys that they trust as a screen and roll threat. They trust Gary Payton, they trust Jimmy, they trust Straymont. They're not going to run a bunch of spread pick and roll with Moses Moody because they don't trust him as much

as a read and react threat. But as soon as they get Gary Payton onto Shangun immediately in fall screen, boom hits the pocket, Gary Payton gets downhill, Jimmy Butler cuts behind Tarry Easton. You get your classic tic tac toet sequence. That's classic Warriors basketball that you can get because you have your regular traditional matchups that the Warriors like to attack. Here's another clean I talked a lot last night about how I thought Fred van Vliet actually

got some pretty clean looks against drop coverage. Here's another example of that. He gets Draymond Green deep in a drop, Steph gets hit on the screen, gets a clean look there. He missed most of them in this game, but I actually thought Fred got some decent looks that he might be able to hit over the course of the series. This is an example of Steph beating a switching scheme by just going really, really fast. So I want to

play at full speed first. As you can see, Steph comes off of the curl and gets the tough layup over Tari Easton at the basketball. Let's look at some specifics here. So Steph's being guarded by Tari Easton. We get the screen. Now, watch as Raymond screens Dylan Brooks is gonna switch. But what I want you to see is what happens to Dylan Brooks's weight distribution right on the switch. Watch notice as he's passing off Draymond, his weight and his body is turned this way towards the baseline.

Look at how Steph's body is turned that way towards towards the scores table right. What that allows is for Steph to have that split second of momentum advantage before Dylan Brooks can get his body turned around. That allows Steph to get that initial separation. Then no messing around, just attack quickly. Because Steven Adams isn't actually up to catch him, He's able to turn the corner on Dylan Brooks. And then this was the first of several just insanely

tough shots that Steph hitting this game. This crazy scoop over Tara Easton at the basket man a man look with Steven Adams early in the game before they went zone. Very simple progression here, So as you screen the top man as Steph comes off, you have some nail help here from Tari Eason, and this is you know, probably an overhelp from Tarry Easton. But again Steven Adams can give up some dribble penetration there, so I get it.

Notice what Jimmy does immediately when he sees Tarry Easton's step up, he just gets ready to drive into that slot. He gets into the gap. Steven Adams has all of his momentum going towards the corner, so Jimmy's.

passes lower volume. He only ran forty nine possessions in the whole season, but that's at least worth exploring a little bit more as a half court option for Houston when nobody else on their team can even come close to generating consistent offense. We get a transition, but this is right after that made basket. This is that transition

push I talked about last night. Steph just brings the ball up with pace, and when he does, he ends up engauging Steven Adams in a transition cross match that gives him an option for a player he can easily drive right around. So he drives right around Steven Adams. And then second insane finish, Shangoon waiting at the rim, Jabari Smith coming from behind, up and under just ridiculous shot from Steph Curry. This was Houston's first zone defense rep.

I wanted to show you guys an example of just how much this zone can move around and kind of shape shift and become whatever that possession needs it to be. So, as you guys can see, Aman Thompson and Fred Van Vliet are the top guys. Steven Adams is underneath, Shane Gun's in the corner, and Dylan Brooks is in the opposite corner. Notice as Golden State moves around, how everyone just kind of moves kind of moves with Golden State's

offense and adjusts and moves. Dylan Brooks started in this corner, Now he's going to be in the opposite corner. Fred van Vliet started as a top man, now he's down in the corner. Shangon started as a low man. He's now up at the top of the key. This gets past Dylan Brooks now rises up to the wing. Now Steven Adams is now in this corner and Shangoon is the low man. Aman Thompson's up top and Fred van

Bleetz in the corner. See how they can like move and shift spots to take away openings as the possession calls for it. All of a sudden, there's six on the shot clock and there's no advantage in Brandon Pajemski has to settle for a step back three again. Houston was they were lower volume because they didn't start running it till the end of the year, but they were consistently one of the best zone defenses in the NBA last year at volume. Here's a Shangoon initiated possession against

Quinton Post attacking at the top of the key. Here, nice little hook over his left shoulder. When you look at all of the actual initiated possessions from Shangun. So if Shangoon ran a post up, if Shangoon ran an iso, Shanguon ran an inverted ball screen. There were thirteen of those possessions last night, and the Warriors only allowed eight points. They actually defended the Shangun initiated actions pretty well. It

was just like catches in the pocket. We talked about offensive rebounds, some of that mid range spacing that was where Shane Goon did most of his damage. This was Golden State's one bucket for the zone and it was just a classic example of Fred Van Vliet saying darry to score to Draymond. So like, if this is anybody else, Fred's matched up, but he's just not guarding Draymond. So Draymond just drives right down the middle and shoots.

to get catches, Gie Santos is up there. Pods is literally denying the high post catch. The whole point of the possession is to get him to dwindle into the clock because they don't know what to do. Finally, Fred van Vliet drives and they eventually get a post entry pass to Jabari Smith, but by the time they get it to him, it's only seven seconds left, he's completely surrounded by help defenders and he ends up turning the basketball over. I thought this was classic Draymond Green gamesmanship.

So we have a Jimmy Butler drive and Gie Santos is cutting through from the slot through to this corner. Jimmy Butler is going to rip baseline and drive along this baseline. Watch what Draymond Green does. Just classic dream uk. Green literally just fucking throws a block at Jabari Smith's

as he runs right into him. Now, the genius in this play is it looks like a duck in So the way he can get away with this is technically, if Jimmy Butler's driving along this baseline, whatevery big in the NBA will do is what they call teeing up. He's going to flash right here to the top of the charge circle to make himself available for a catch. Should Jimmy Butler drive through this baseline, he would run into Draymond Green. So Draymond Green has to relocate up

here naturally as part of the possession. But Draymond Green uses that as an excuse to basically get away with throwing a moving screen at Jabari Smith, which gets Gi Santo's open. Nice little gamesmanship from Draymond Green. I thought this was a bad decision from Jabari Smith. Junior catches on the wing here. This is in the zone. Look again, He's gonna rip baseline and when he rips baseline.

He ends up gambling on Steph in the back court and when he does that ends up getting Steph a clean drop coverage look against Shang Gun that he knocks down. I talked a lot about how you can do a better job on defense and double teams by pressuring the ball so the kickout passes are harder. As Shanegun drives here, I want you guys to see what happens when the double team comes. So he drives right here, he sees he sees the red right. So Pods is there, Moody's there,

they're double teaming. Or excuse me, not Moody. Looney is there, they're double teaming. He sees Fred as the reed, but against the pressure, he has to find a passing angle. And so look, he knows he wants to make that pass, but Looney and Pods pressure the hell out of him.

get gets disconnected. It's a deeper shot, but because Steph is disconnected, he knows he can get into his rhythm and he knocks down the shot once again, though incredibly difficult shot making from Steph Curry. I thought this was just a genius off ball cut move from Steph to get open against some n Thompson. So I want to play at full speed first, and then I want to see if you guys notice what I'm talking.

on the back cut. Really really smart gamesmanship from Steph Curry to get himself another easy one. A little piece of tough shot making from Jimmy. Butler hits a little bright shoulder fade over a men Thompson. Notice that little shoulder fake is worth everything there on the shoulder fake. Look at him in A man's got his head turned and his body takes that whoops, star guys. His body takes that one negative step way back here to the second block, and that gives Jimmy the separation and needs

to knock down the shot. Jimmy made six jump shots in this game, five in the mid range. That was a huge piece of ceiling raising on offense for the Warriors. I have no idea what Jalen Green was doing here. I think Dylan Brooks is also in this action. Let's get over to the corner here, so we have Jimmy being guarded by Dylan Brooks and Pods comes up to set the screen, and I like, Jalen Green just ends up like just clawing all the way up here to double team. And my thing is like, let's say that's

a switch. Let's say it's a switch. Make Jimmy dribble off the screen, sit back a little bit, and if Jimmy dribbles off the screen, then you pick him up that way. Dylan Brooks, as he's dribbling off, can drop back and get inside position on Pods to prevent the slip. Instead, Jalen Green just throws this bullshit double team and it just makes the easiest slip pass ever to Pods on the back door. A lot of defensive mistakes from Jalen Green in this one. Another stot. Draymond Green gets a

good stop against Shangoon. He won most of those battles last night, like I talked about. And then we get this ISO three from Jimmy Butler against the men Thompson at the end of the clock that puts the Warriors up twenty. Another nice bit of shot making from Jimmy Butler.

Draymond did this a couple times last night. So they're trying to set up a high low action here, right, So Tarry Yeason has inside position on Steph Curry, Draymond Green's guarding Shanggon, but Shang Goon just shows an unwillingness to score here, and so when Shangoon throws the pass, Raymond just drops back and he's able to disrupt and get the pass. Then on the other end of the floor, going to fast forward a little bit, you guys know what happens here, Steph gets Jalen Green on a switch

late in the shot clock. Here's one of those last four seconds of the clock shots that I was talking about. One of the most ridiculous shots I've seen Steph hit in his career.

Pods ends up trying to create something. He ends up picking up his dribble in the middle of the floor. Moody just flashes right in front of Fred van Vliet, gets open for like a little catch and shoot seventeen foot er fading to his left and knocks it down. I was a big shot in that game when the

game got down to four. This was just an insane piece of shot making from Steph Curry look running to his right from about thirty five feet against the contests from Amen Thompson, just sticks it off the back of the rim.

guarding him Men Thompson here in the right corner. The next obvious read for Jabari Smith is to drop it off to Shangoon. Pods catches the drive, Moody makes the rotation and forces the steel. Jimmy Butler cleans it up. Really really good defense in that sequence from Moses Moody and from uh Brandon Pajemski. This was one of the big time rebounds that Brandon Pajemski had at the end

of the game, just out working Fred van Vliet. Here after the shot goes up, Moody gets a clean look but watch so Pods and and Fred are both watching, but Pods makes the effort gets to the tap and when he gets to the tap, he occupies both Shangoon and Jabari Smith, which allows Draymond Green to come in and clean it up from behind. Warriors attacking Jalen Green in action again, this time to get two on the ball and open up.

Watch the side step going to his right. This is the game. This is the go to move that Jimmy Butler has now that he can get to and knock down whenever he needs to. So yeah, as you guys can see a lot of the stuff that we talked about last night, Jalen Green being attacked in action, the Warriors defending extremely well against the Rockets, their zone causing them issues. There's just such a gap in that skill IQ, gamesmanship, decision making, playmaking, all of that skews heavily in Golden

State's favor. And as long as they don't completely hemorrhage points on the margins, they're going to do really well.

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