Hoops Tonight - Film Breakdowns: How the Nuggets & Knicks Stole Game 1

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focusing on their shot selection in the second half. Fair warning to Celtics fans, it will be one of the most frustrating film sessions you've ever watched, because they played some straight CTE basketball in that second half and cost themselves game one of the series. You guys are the joke before we started subscribe to the Hoops tonight YouTube channels. You don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore JSNLTC. You guys don't miss sho announcements.

Dont forget about a podcast feed wherever you get your podcast on our hoops Tonight. It's also super helpful if you leave a rating and a review on that front. Jackson's also doing great work on our social media feed. Make sure you guys follow us there Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. And then, last but not least, keep dropping mail bag questions in those YouTube comments. All right, So, as we start off with Denver, ok Seed, I will never overreact

to one game. I would not change my prediction until I saw something be repeated in a game two. But I am severely concerned for Oklahoma City after that first game, in large part because in the second half, in particular, Denver had their defense solved and got great shots every

single time. Down on the floor, they had what a thirty one point quarter and a thirty five point quarter, And on the other end of the floor, through a combination of some one two two zone, some double teams of Shay, especially late as he was driving but also on his wing ISOs, they were strong side zoning and a bunch of different stuff like that, and okay, see just looked lost. They looked like they didn't have any

idea how to attack. There's also a basic reality in the sense that in order to match up with Jokic on the glass, they have to play Hartenstein and Alex Cruso is just such an important defensive player for them to be able to hold up in this matchup. If you have Hartenstein and Crusoe on the floor, you make yourself easier to guard. And so there's another question to

be another conversation to be had about whether or not. Okay, so you should consider just playing small and understanding they're going to get beat up on the glass, but at least be able to score the ball more effectively. And those are the kinds of things they're gonna have to figure out over the course of the series.

So this first one, we have the Gordon high post entry here to the Jemal Murray high post entry to Aaron Gordon that Alex Cruso jumps the high side and gets the steal again, and it wasn't twenty nine to twenty three. So Oklahoma City gets twenty three points off of turnovers compared to just five for Oklahoma for Denver, so an eighteen point advantage for Oklahoma City in a clear margin. That is what Oklahoma City does better than everybody. That was where they caught Denver off guard last night.

You catch Denver off guard with your defense and you score twenty three easy ones in transition and you still lose the game. Just a devastating game one outcome for the Thunder. And that's that's just an easy place where Denver can clean stuff up. Like if we watch Gordon here, the mistake he's making is he's his contact. His contact with Alex is on Alex's left shoulder. There there's nothing ceiling Alex from working up this high side Aaron Gordon's gonna have a do a better job in game two

of just ceiling and creating a better passing angle. There, Jdubb shooting a little floater over Jokic in a drop coverage. He gets a ball screen here, a little double screen. Little reverses the second screen and takes this kind of like contested leaning away from his body floater against Jokic.

Last night, JDub was one for six on two's that were outside of the restricted area and two for five at the rim, so three for eleven overall in the paint, and you guys will see plenty of examples in this film session of him just taking like pretty mediocre contested mid range shots, especially early in the clock. Here goes Jokicic just posting up Chet home grindly. Fast forward a little bit so Yokic on Chet, they run a little

loft ball action. Jokicic just easily backs him down, gets to his spot and knocks down the little left shoulder hook. Jokic just did his work against Chet. That was a big part of why they ended up going to Hartenstein down the stretch, not just for the glass but also dealing with him in their defensive scheme, so they could put Hartenstein on Jokic and put Chet on Gordon behind the ball.

example of the offensive rebounding problem that Denver presents. Fast forwarding a little bit here, so Chet's out of the play, ends up chasing Jamal Murray down and tries to go for a block at the rim. Now, what I want you guys to watch is the dynamic with Jokic behind the play there as Chet's out of the play. Look at the size advantage. It's Jokic with a bunch of six four sixty five guys around him. He's gonna just

eat everybody alive on the glass in this matchup. And you're gonna see some more examples later in the game. There's just not a whole lot they can do. Same sort of thing here. Look like Chet shows on this dribble handoff and gets a good contest on Jamal which forces a miss. But now look at this dynamic. You've got Yoki rolling to the rim, Gordon on the baseline, and Christian Brown crashing out of the corner, and it's

j Dubshay and Alex Cruza. They're just completely overwhelmed. Shay steps over to try to box out Jokic and Christian Brown is the beneficiaries right there.

is gapping down off of Chet. Michael Porter and Jamal Murray both are basically foot in the paint. They're just packing the side and as they they relocate through, Alex Crusoe relocates through, Shay gives it up to him. Then they immediately double Shay off of the Off of that dribble handoff, Chay actually makes a nice pass through Christian Brown's legs here to Alex Crusoe, but now Alex Cruso drives through, makes a nice drop off. This was a

good example of them breaking down the double team. But I mainly just wanted to highlight that clip to show you guys just how aggressive Denver is being in there loading up against Shay, and like we talked about this, like I talked about it in the series preview, They're gonna load up. This is going to be a processing series for the Oklahoma City Thunder. So now we have Hartenstein in the game and we're getting that look that

I talked about. Hartenstein on Jokic and Aaron Gordon on Chet, and they run a ball screen to get Dort switched onto Jokic. Then Jokic basically attacks Dort and look at Chet that's in help. And these are the kinds of shots that Jokic is so good at. He spins off the small and floats over the big, just elite shot making there from Nicola Jokich a double team of Shay

on this iso along the baseline. But this creates a rebounding mismatch underneath the basket because now Chet and Hartenstein are going two on one against Jokich and they're able to get in there and get an offensive rebound. If Denver is going to double team Shay and throw all this attention at Shay, you have to make them pay for it through quick processing to get quality looks and by attacking the offensive glass. Aaron Gordon here gets open

in transition and makes a three. A lot of examples in the second half of Aaron Gordon getting open in transition at the three point line, most famously on the game winner, something Oklahoma City is gonna have to pay attention to. They got to track Aaron Gordon. He is running to the three point line. Another example of how Denver is guarding OKC. We're gonna get a Hartenstein Shay two man game with some weak side action. But look,

Jamal Murray's ignoring that action. They're not worried about this at all whatsoever. On the play, Denver is defending the ball screen three on two and Shay and Hartenstein just stay on that side of the floor. These guys are kind of cutting and moving around, but there's no attempt to actually get the ball across to the other side. They just try to score three on two and that's really hard. We get a Shay airball because of an excellent rear view contest from Christian Brown off of the

ball screen. But if they're just going to play two on three and one on two all series and not actually look to move the ball and beat Denver's loaded up defense, this series could get ugly for Oklahoma City pretty quick. Once again, similarly to that last iso that we saw from Shay on the other side of the floor, look at how they're loaded up strongside zone loaded up from Yokich. It almost looks like a box in one

with the way they set up against these ISOs. They run a nice little off ball action for Isaiah Joe as he kind of relocates up to the top. There cuts through relocates to the top. Watch Michael Porter Junior excellent read and react defensive play to get a late contest on Isaiah Joe and force an airball. Look at how Yokic in the middle of the floor commands so much attention on this pocket pass. He's got four bodies

completely geared up on him. So what ends up happening here is it creates all these really high quality offensive rebound opportunities on the back line for Gordon, for Russ four Brown on the miss. Look at Gordon, Gordon's untouched, Gordon's untouched crashing because Yokic is drawing four bodies on that roll to the basket. I just I don't see a solution for Okac.

Denver defense, high ball screen against the drop. Nineteen on the shot clock. Jdubb just takes another look at look at this great rear view can test from Russ. Russ is right there and there's seventeen seconds on the shot clock. And but that's the thing. Ja Dob's just very young. He's young, and he hasn't been in too many of these types of series. And last night he took a lot of bad shots and he went five for twenty.

And you know that doesn't mean he can't go twelve for twenty in Game two and look like the hero. But there's a level of consistency that you see from Vetteran basketball players that you don't see from the younger basketball players. Really nice back to or cut here from Russ on the Jamal Murray drive. Watch Russ as Jamal drives. Nice read on that backhut. Great pass from Jamal quickly goes up and finishes. When OKC, excuse me, when OKAC actually looked to move the ball in the middle of

the floor. They got good stuff. Here's an example. Shade comes off the ball screen. There's three Nuggets defending the action. Simple driving kick to Jalen Williams, wide open catch and shoot, three goes in. Just that's the processing piece that they're gonna have to be very sharp with in this series. I thought I just pulled this clip because I thought it perfectly demonstrated the problem that Okays he's dealing with

with Yo Kitchen this series. Look at he just looks like a man amongst boys, a man amongst boys.

screen navigation from Alex. You end up in a late clock situation after Jokic passes the ball out of the Hartenstein drive.

gets the defensive rebound. Here's another example of a successful double and rotate against Shay double team.

relentlessly making those reads every time down the floor. Jokic going one on five and just getting to the rim nine point game, two point two and a half minutes left. Watch Jokich here just drives into five Thunder players and gets into the lane and draws a foul.

They rotate out of it, rotate to Jdubb. This is the passing lane close out from Jamal that we talked about on playback last night. Watch how Jamal doesn't close out to Jaydubbit closes out to the passing lane that bits JDub into throwing this pass fake which allows Russ to rotate. JDub ends up passing it off to Hartenstein, who misses the floater big time rebound fro Russell Westbrook too.

In crunch time with six point game, two minutes, fifteen seconds left, Denver runs a random possession of a one two two zone?

one two two zone type of look. But what it may be is kind of a similar principle to what we talked about on those Shay ISOs on the wing, where they just use the two closest defenders on either side of the driving lane to essentially zone up in

just these two spots. But as you guys can see, every time Shay gets the ball, whether it's at the top of the key, whether it's on the wing or over here, they're manning up and then they're basically having the other four defenders zone up in like a box in one on Shay's ISOs, and it just flummecks them this they end up throwing a quick little swing pass the chat Homegern and missus a three more Yokic dominance.

This time A gets Alex Crusoe. Let's fast forward, we get a ball screen switch, toss the ball back to Jokic against Alex, and then it's just back down. Four dribbles ready, boom one, two, three, four, left shoulder hook. I mean, there's a double team from Jadub here and Chet's on the back line, and it just doesn't matter. Again, Like, I'm curious if you guys have some ideas drop him

in the comments. I don't understand a pathway for Oklahoma City to solve that specific problem in this series, and that doesn't mean they can't find solutions on this end of the floor. Okay, see has a lot of solutions on this end of the floor. But on the defensive end, I don't know how they're going to stop Denver from just routinely putting up sixty five point halves the way that they did in that second half. Here we go again,

same sort of Yokic Shay loaded up ISO. They brought a lot of these kind of late double teams like what Russ does here miss jump shot. This was Chet's first opportunity to win this game that he blew. He beats Aaron Gordon on this like corner crash and has the game in his hands right there. You finished that. It's one seventeen, one to eleven with a minute twenty seven left in Denver's in an infinitely tougher spot to try to win this game. Good example of jab step

work from Nikola Jokic. Here fast forward. He ends up faced up with Isai Hartenstein at the top of the key. Okay, what I want you guys to look at is look at where Look at where Hartenstein's feet is as he's pressuring Jokic. He's got his left foot on the three point line. Now, watch as he's working this jab step game jab jab again. Look at where Hartenstein's feed are.

Now he got Hartenstein from the NBA line to the top of the key, and that creates the separation for him to step into that three and knock it down more, packing the pain on shake Gildes Alexander, Jamal little hedge and recover drives again late double team from Russell Westbrook. Shaye makes the right read and kicks the jdup here, but then Jadub needs to make the next read right. So, first of all, first mistake, he has the ability to get middle here, and if he gets middle, he will

likely take Jamal Murray or take Jokic with him. And if he takes Jokic with him towards the middle of the floor, Jamal Murray has to make a decision either to step up and help or to drop back on one of these two guys. And you've got two guys that can finish at the rim. Instead, he racks Baseline

into Alex Crusoe. Okay, now it's an easy set of a help reads because Alex Crusoe is a complete non threat and Alex Crusoe, because he's a non threat, has to relocate out and Jay dub has an opportunity to kick to dort Here on the right wing if he makes a clean catch and shoot clean close out read instead, though he tries to finish in traffic over a set of three defenders Bruss great late contest, great defensive rebound

from Jokic. So as you can see, if he racks to the middle, if he racks to the middle, he's likely getting a layup for or a dunk for one of these two guys. If you rack Spaceline, fine whatever, even though that's the bad read, there's your kickout. These are the kinds of reads that Oklahoma City's going to have to make that they just did not make in Game one. And I talked about this before the series. This is where they've shown growth this year, but a

lot of regression last night. And then, just for fun for Nuggets fans, here's the game winner. Really nice read in transition from Russell Westbrook. Big time shot from Aaron Gordon to steal game one. All right, let's talk Boston's offense. Fair warning, Celtics fans, this is going to be a tough watch for you. The Celtics on four consecutive possessions to start the third quarter took off the dribble threes or ISO threes.

off the dribble three. At least this one there's a decent amount of separation, but still like these are just every time down the floor. They're just dribbling up the floor and taking it the first three that they get. Any attempts to get some separation on something to keep an eye on to you. Look at how bad this miss was from Tatum, and I'm gonna be calling this out throughout the film sessions. As a star, he needs

to read that. He doesn't have a going Look at the miss hits the backboard first, that's a brick, and there's like a bunch of those to show that example. But here we go off the offensive rebound. So offensive rebound, Tatum pressures the rim on the offensive rebound draws, the second defender makes a kick. Derek White clean catch and shoot. Look goes in. Boston took fifteen unguarded catch and shoot jump shots in the second half of this game, including overtime.

They got eighteen points on them, one point two points per shot. They shot poorly on unguarded catch and shoots in the first half, but they actually made their unguarded catching shoots in the second half. The problem is on the other twenty six and tested or off the dribble jump shots they took. They got just twelve points on those shots. There was a clear line between their process and their success in the second half. Here's another off the dribble three with lots of clock left, no attempt

to get the ball in the paint. Again, it's not a bad look for Derek White. We know they can win playing that one way. My thing is, you've got to be able to make the read and change your play style if it's obvious that something's not working. Here's another classic example of that ideology. Watch Jalen Brown. Okay, so he smokes this has to pass it out? Sure, whatever, Okay, Jalen Brown's man runs out. He throws the pass out

to Drew Holiday. Just stay right there, Just stay right there and call for the ball, and you're gonna get a lamp or a dunk.

to attack there or there. Instead, they run a ball screen with Tatum, which brings og In and Obi into the action, and Tatum ends up taking Tatum ends up having OJN and Obi on him and swinging it back to Derek White. This goes in. But that stupid offense. You just took your mismatch and brought the other team's best defender into the action and ended up having to take a contested catch and shoot like twenty eight footer at the end of the clock. Also, I wanted to

come back. Shout out to Jalen Brunson in the way he battled Horford here. There were a couple examples of this down the stretch. Let me show you guys, watch him battling and fronting the post trying to deny those post entry opportunities. Great work from Brunson. I don't know what the hell they're doing on offense. On this possession, Derek White hits a three, but like once again, like, no attempts to get the ball inside in any way, shape or form, just a swing pass and a contested

twenty seven footer off of the left wing. Again, Jalen Brown has missed every three that he's taken in the second half, and they've all been pretty bad shots. Let's see what he looks to do here on the skip eleven seconds on the shot clock. You can't shoot right now, drive the closeout. Drive the close out. You will generate a better shot for a better shooter. Instead, he takes another three and misses it. I don't know what the hell this possession was. Derek White literally just dribbles the

clock out and takes a three. Scott Brunson off the dribble twenty seven footer like that. I just don't understand it. Here we go again, another zero penetration move, just to swing past to Horford for early clock transition three. Tatum after the Knicks, make this little run here to cut it to eleven. Hits a couple of threes, but these are once again, you guys have seen this is in the context of the previous possessions.

the point. Another example of me not knowing what the hell Tatum's doing. Ball screen just another early clock contested pull up three that he misses. I don't know what the hell this possession is just swing and shoot like they're just they're just taking the first available three without making any attempt to try to get the ball inside. There's another zero drive possession like Horford hits this shot, but there's just no attempt to get the ball inside.

All right, early fourth quarter, Jalen Brown's turn to try to assert control over the situation. Let's see what he does. I soo against kat. Let's see what you got and you know what's crazy? Look at this, Look at the spacing. If Jalen just goes to the basket, if he just rips right and goes, he will draw McHale, bridges and help, and he will generate a wide open catch and shoot three for Derek White, like guaranteed that will happen if he just rips right. Look at how open cat stances.

Kat is incapable of containing Jaylen Brown in this stance driving to the right. Instead, Jalen waits for McHale to get into the driving lane and for that space to go away, and then he settles for this tough step back, mid range jump shot and airballs it. It's like baffling to me. Peyton Pritchard's turn to get in on the action and just take a step back. Three some quality switching from New York there, Jason Tatum against Josh Hart. This is actually a nice little snatchback dribble. But again

look at the clock. Eighty four to eighty. Tatum comes off of this action. Snatchback dribble breaks Josh off in theory. You don't hate this shot, but what I want to I'm more concerned about what happens after this point, Brick. Okay, look at the miss. The miss is off to the left of the rim. This is a miss by feet. It barely grazed the bottom of the backboard outside of the rim, and he got clean separation and a great look. So like it's clear that his jump shot is off.

Read that make the adjustment. A rushed contested corner three from Derek White here swing swing contested three nineteen on the shot clock.

more aggressive. Let's see if we see any change in approach from Tatum.

into serious crisis mode. Let's see how Boston looks to attack on offense starts with this kind of iffy catch and shoot three. It's a decent look for Derek White fifteen seconds of the shot clock. Don't hate it, and at least they got the ball inside to Brunson. Don't hate it. But what the hell is Drew Holliday doing here? A spinning off of a spinning out of rhythm offensive rebound kickout three with thirteen on the shot clock, out of the corner while he's leaning one of the worst

shots I've seen and Drew take in his career. Okay, nine seven ninety five Tatum on cat. Oh, we're driving to the basket now, guys, drive into the basket. Drawing multiple defenders, drop off the drew holiday, beautiful extra pass, clean catch and shoot. Look it goes in. Okay, so we know that Tatum driving to the basket is working. He just drove to the basket successfully on Cat. You don't need to run this screening action again. But Tatum instead is going to take another off the dribble three

eleven on the shot clock. Another off the dribble three, even though he knows his shot is off. He literally he knows his shot is off. He bricked the shit out of his of like three or four of his jump shots in his half. And what do we get another outside the rim miss look, barely grazes the left side of the rim and goes down. Doesn't even go up off the rim, which means he barely grays the left side of the rim. And then we get a couple moves on Jalen Brunson here that are both geared

towards the pullback. Again, no attempt to actually drive. It's like pullback. Everything's geared towards the pullback. I'm trying to get a three. He's driving to get jump shots. He's not driving to get to the basket on this play, right, here he's very capable of right here spinning pound the dribble, spin and you're in this part of the lane, drawing multiple defenders and making something good happen. No, but it's geared towards the pullback. Everything mentality wise is geared towards

the pull up jump shot. I do want to give Brunton some credit for his defense here. Again Tatum's letting him off the hook, but these are some nice off the dribble cutoffs from brunts and sliding his feet. He was great on defense down the stretch of this game. This is why I was so annoyed at this play. As you guys saw, they were mixing in hedges and recovers with Brunson, especially on some of those Tatum cat actions. But when Brunson was switched on Tatum, he was able

to actually bait Tatum taking into taking bad shots. You guys will see another example of it in overtime. Here's a random possession where they threw the hedge and recover and gave up a layup hedge slip, wide open layup. That was what tied the game and sent it to overtime. So like for the Knicks, just trust Brunson's ability to defend on an island, and you'll bait Boston into doing stupid shit. If you do this, you can give them

these easy reads that they're going to take layups. Tatum, big possession of the game, gets a switch on to Mitchell. Robinson settles for the step back three again again like it's so clear at least he's inside the rim on that one, but like, like he just it was so clear that the jumper wasn't there for him, and he just made no attempt to change his approach. Another just unbelievably stupid shot from Drew Holliday, no passes step back

three against literally against the knicks best defender. A zero pass step back three for Drew Holiday, down three in overtime. Here's the other Tatum io against Brunson, fast forward.

switch with McHale Bridges and we get a layup. There is a clear indication that every single time Boston applied rim pressure and trusted their process, they got either good stuff at the rim or good catch and shoot stuff that went in. And every time they did something stupid, they played into variants.

tape speaks for itself. That's one of the dumbest halves of basketball that I've seen Boston play in the Jason Tatum era. All right, guys, it's all I have for today. It's all as always, I sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting me and supporting the show. We will be live on YouTube tonight after the final buzzer of Warriors Timberwolves, and then we'll be live on playback after that.