Hoops Tonight - GAME 1 REACTIONS: Steph's Warriors beat Rockets + Cavaliers-Heat, Celtics-Magic, Thunder-Grizzlies

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We have the Warriors getting a one zero lead on the road in Houston against the Rockets, the Cleveland Cavaliers struggling a little bit with Miami but closing the deal, the Celtics struggling a little bit with Orlando but closing the deal, and then an absolute annihilation of the Memphis Grizzlies by the Oklahoma City Thunder. I'll just give my initial impressions on the games from the perspective of both teams. Like I said, more film coming later today, So keep

an eye on the feeds. You guys have the drip before we get started. Subscribe to the Hoops and I YouTube channels. You don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter, underscore Jason Lts you guys, don't miss you announcements. Don't forget about a podcast few wherever you get your podcast under Hoops Tonight. It's also super helpful if you leave your rating and a review on that front. Jackson's doing great work on our news media.

If heeds on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook making content throughout the season. Make sure you guys follow us there, and last not least, keepdropping mailback questions in the YouTube comments. We can keep getting to him throughout the remainder of the season. All right, let's talk some basketball. So with Warriors Rockets, I can't start anywhere other than Steph Curry.

I talked a lot about the different dynamics between the two defenses trying to slow each other down, but I thought that was one of the better playoff games I've

seen Steph Curry play. When you factor in just how great this Houston defense is, the specific ways they defend him, the fact that in a game like this where there wasn't consistent offense from really anybody else aside from a few key plays made from a few key Warriors late, it just was a steady diet of really difficult shot making from Steph Curry in this game, and over and over and over again, he came through to hit a

big shot when his team needed him too. There was a couple easy things he was able to find in

terms of like sustainability throughout the series. You know, we talked before the series about how the Rockets put Alpurn Shangun on Moses Moody and how that kind of disrupts the normal screen game for the Warriors because they want to use Draymond as a screener for Steph Curry, but they're going to try to switch those actions as much as possible, Right, So where would Curry go to be able to find the separation that he needs to get

more comfortable? Well, Jalen Green ended up being the target through early screens and the possessions to get Jalen switched on to Steph. Jalen was having a hard time staying attached to Steph. He was having a hard time fighting over screens. He was more likely to batch switches. There were so many different things that once Steph got Jalen on him, he had an easier time getting free, and then he had a couple of other things right. He was able to batcut him and Thompson a couple times.

He was able to get free and transition a few times. There was a play where on a made basket, he pushed the ball at the floor so fast that he engaged Steven Adams in a transition crossmatch and was able to be Steven Adams off the dribble for a layup. There was another one where Fred van Vliet gambled on him out at half court.

Men Thompson. The movement thirty footer that he hit just like running to his right way above the break off the right side extended.

It was almost like you got to see in the last two Houston Rockets game, like the two furthest edges of the Steph Curry experience, the like, can't make shots, but I'm still creating shots for my team, and then like, oh my god, it doesn't matter what you do or where I'm at on the floor, get ready to take that shit out of the net, because it's going in.

It was just an unbelievable Steph Curry game. I told you guys before the Jimmy Butler trade that what I was most excited for and one of the main reasons why I wanted the deal. I obviously saw upside. I believed in the Warriors roster. I thought they just needed secondary shot creation. But I also, as a basketball fan, just wanted more opportunities to see Steph Curry playing high leverage basketball games. And we got to see that tonight, and he put on just another incredible show and I

just really really enjoyed watching it. Warriors defense Steve Curry in a timeout in the first half said, quote unquote, they cannot score against us unless we turn it over. That really is the theory for this entire series for the Warriors. I talked about it beforehand, like there's a lot of ways that Houston can make gold In State uncomfortable, and I have no doubt that throughout the series they

will make Golden State uncomfortable. They made Golden State uncomfortable for extended stretches tonight, but none of that can compare to the damage that Golden State can do to Houston's offense.

need to give Shangun some credit. But they completely neutralized Jalen Green, played up on him with physicality. I thought Moses Moody did an amazing job on him all night, rushed him into bad drives. Fred Van Vliet was the one Houston perimeter guy that I thought got some decent looks at, some drop covered shots and some catch and shoot threes. But he just couldn't hit anything. And by the way, Fred's not a great jump shooter. Fred van vliet jump shot all season long has been worth less

than a point. That's a thing that could happen multiple times in this series. Fred just not being able to hit shots, and that really is the thing. If you can cut Jalen Green and Fred Van Vliet out, there's not enough firepower on this Rockets offense consistently. I've talked about this year, the Rockets when they get scoring pop,

particularly from Jalen Green, they can beat anybody. They were thirteen and one this year, which Jalen Green had over thirty points, and a lot of really good teams were victims of those types of performances. But if you can cut the head off the snake, if you can take out Fred van Vliet and Jalen Green, they do not have the firepower to keep up with really anybody, and

they completely neutralize those guys their zone defense. That talked before the series about how any comments about the zone defense and it bothering the Warriors was insignificant compared to the Rockets being able to score against the zone and the major run early in the game when the Warriors really started to take their first commanding lead came against

came with the Rockets struggling to score against the Warriors zone. Look, it's just they just don't have the offensive fire power to score consistently in the half court against a good defense. And again I've said this a couple of times. The Warriors were quite literally the number one defense in the NBA after the All Star Break. They've been playing at that level consistently since they've identified that they have a

real opportunity to win the title. Here, we did see a late Houston Rockets run, fueled by their competitiveness and their rebounding some transition pushes shanng guns shot making. The Warriors will have to be careful throughout this series with their discipline. They can lose control of these games fast if they don't stay disciplined in their game plan, discipline, take care of the basketball, smart shot selection, avoiding those

transition opportunities as much as possible. I thought the closing group played fantastic after Houston made it close, just defending Houston into their worst tendency, but on the other end of the floor, getting really consistent contributions from the entire group.

Moses Moody, who's been really struggling to hit jump shots as of late, hit two massive jump shots, a rescue shot at the end of the shot clock, a little movement catch and shoot jump shot out by like seventeen feet from the basket that he knocked down, and then he hit a huge corner three off of that text textbook steph Curry pocket pass sequence that was a massive shot to counter three that Houston had hit. I talked about his individual defense on Jalen Green. Brandon Pajemski in

this game really smart reaid and reacts sequences. He had a great one late in the game where he caught Jabari Smith on his backside driving a closeout and just baited Steven Adams into stepping up a little bit and threw a perfect bounce past to Gary Payton on the baseline, who got to finish. Gary Payton had another transition run out for a bucket, so Gary Payton was scoring. Draymond Green had an offensive rebound put back on another player.

Brandon Pajemski came flying in and tapped at the rebound. This, in addition to Jimmy being able to go to his step back jump shot to the right and knock it down to rescue some of those possessions. I was on with Colin Cowhard last night or technically tonight because that's

when I'm recording it. But when I was on with Colin, I talked about how Jimmy Butler has this go to move that he really started to build out towards the end in Minnesota and showed it quite a bit in Philly, and then a lot here in the last few years in Miami, and obviously here in Golden State. He can like hit that hard pound dribble in and out with his right hand and cover some ground going to the right and just elevate and square up in mid air.

And that's a good look for Jimmy. He's going to hit that look at a decent percentage, and he was able to knock that down. Lots of support for Steph Curry down the stretch after he had carried them throughout the game. Really really impressive stuff. We did get a

DMP from Jonathan Kaminga. I think there was probably a game plan there that had things gone worse, like had Houston taken a ten point lead in the second quarter, I think we probably see Jonathan Kaminga but I thought Steve Kerr played the right cards tonight, sticking with guys that were gonna make fewer mistakes so they can stay out of transition. And for the most part I understood

him sticking with that for now. But to be clear, f it's Game two and Houston's up, you know, thirty seven to twenty four in the early second quarter, I think Steve Kerr's gotta pull that card out of the

deck and at least try it. He's got to at least give Johnan kaminga a little bit of a runway just to see if he can, I don't know, rebound, do something to help the team if they start struggling in that matchup a little bit with the Houston again, it just even as they were knocking on the door, they just couldn't They just couldn't finish it with proper execution. They cut the lead down to four and then like Jalen Green tries to drive and shoot a layup through

like five dudes, and he misses it. They go down to the other end. That was when pods hit Gary Payton on the baseline, then to Men Thompson on the next possession, drives into traffic and throws a layup literally into the bottom of the rim, leads to a runout there where Gary Payton gets a dunk. Like they just couldn't string together the execution in the half court necessary

to score. And that really is the issue now, if you're looking for upside, if you're Houston, something to be like, this is a reason why we feel like we have a chance to still win this series. I thought Steph was literally amazing, like one of the better playoff games I've seen him play. Golden State really struggled to score without him making shots. Jalen Green and Fred Van Vliet could not have been worse than they were. And Houston's

athleticism will travel. It'll travel on the road. They're gonna play hard and be a pain in the ass defensively on the glass every single night. Golden State's not going to just get this team to quit eventually because they don't believe they can win. It's gonna be a pain throughout and so again there's a way for them to drag this series out and try to wear on Golden State physically. The series is certainly not over. It's always

bad to lose game one at home, trust me. I know as a Lakers fan, but there is an opportunity for them there if they play good defense, to try to play Steph into a lower van game and then to get more out of Jalen and Fred to try to win on the other end of the floor.

backup guard in the NBA can be. And he went on a wild run down the stretch of this game came in a bunch of different ways too.

a foul on him. Then he started putting Tyler Harrow in ball screens and that was when he really started to victimize him because Tyler Harrow was not playing physical on the ball. He was not pressuring. He was just kind of running behind ty Jerome as he was coming off the screens, and so ty was able to just make simple decisions. Came off the screen, brought in the low man Davion Mitchell stepped over too far, rifle passed the same Mary in the right corner. He knocks it down.

He hit a floater against Strop. He brought Bam up and then threw a perfect packet pass the Jared Allen, who knocked down a layup, He had a left shoulder fade over him in an ISO. He just was cooking him over and over again. Eventually, Tyler tried to go underneath a ball screen to try to keep ty Jerome in front, and ty just stepped into like a thirty

footer off the dribble and he knocked it down. Then finally the Miami, he just said screw it and they started double teaming and it was just over from there. They were never able to recover. Even Darius Garland came in and ended up hitting a shot against Tyler Harrow in a switch. For the record, Tyler Harrow's problems on defense started right from the opening tip. This was not

an issue that was just a crunch time issue. He immediately gave up a easy driving dunk out of the right corner to Donovan Mitchell early in the game, gave up an easy close out to Max Struce for a drop off for a dunk for Jared Allen. He got back cut by Darius Garland for a floater. He got blown by Darius Garland multiple times. Darius Garland made a layup and missed a layup on easy blowbyes of Tyler Harrow.

They were even giving up drop coverage buckets with Tyler Harrow to Ti Jerome in the first half before we even got to the stuff that we saw in the fourth quarter. So, like, you know, the Heat defense caused issues for the Calves and short bursts with their abilities to switch with their bigs, And I thought Davion Mitchell did a really nice job on Donovan Mitchell, just pressuring him and making him work really hard. And the Heat are never going to be a team that goes down easy.

They are a super smart team and they've got some high level defensive players, and Tyler Harrow is a guy that, as you saw at stretches, can knock down shots and drop coverage and if you leave them open behind the three three point line, he can knock down shots. They have pathways, but they just simply don't have the firepower to keep up with Cleveland. It's a lot of Davion Mitchell running ball screens and like literally initiating offense. It's a lot of like bam at a bio taking tough

jump shots. It was just really tough, and you know, the Calves just found solutions. We talked about Harrow, Donovan Mitchell finally stopped trying to go at Davy. It almost was like Donovan was taking it personally with Davion and like, you're wearing my number in my last name, I'm gonna try to beat you. It's kind of weird. And then as soon as you stop going at Davion, it started going at others. He started to have more success. Evan Mobley did a really nice job of beating switches by

inside seal attacks. He had a dunk on one of those in the first half. You scored out of the post against a switch. Like, they just have a lot of answers because they've got a lot of guys that can play at a really really high level, super super impressive. Game one victory for the Cleveland Cavaliers Celtics Magic. This

game went basically exactly as I expected it to. The Magic are the second best defense in basketball behind the Thunder, and they have a lot of guys who can switch and guard multiple positions, and so they can switch, contain, stay home, take away, some of the catch and shoot looks play Tatum and Brown into really high difficulty ISO basketball.

to thirty three points on thirty six shots. That's great, But outside of a second quarter stretch where Palo got really hot from three, a couple other guys hit some threes, the Magic failed to score twenty points in three of the four quarters, and that was really the difference. I thought Drew Holliday was the defensive hero of the game coming out of the half. So Orlando goes on their big run right before the half. Then there's a couple of mistakes that paloll has a turnover that leads to

a foul. They cut it to one, but Orlando goes into the half up one. They've got the momentum. Their bench is all excited. Drew Holliday came out to start the second half and just started ball pressuring the hell out of Franz Wagner and Palo Bancaro and just was messing those dudes up, forcing turnovers, forcing mishots, running out the other way, and hitting transition threes. You talk about it feeling like a shotgun blast to the chest. Imagine being on the other side of that. You're attacking a

small and a mismatch. Next thing you know, that dude taking the ball away and going the other way and hitting a three. It just unbelievable plays from Drew Holliday and again Drew in terms of just in terms of just fundamental skill is one of the best like rhythm or base attackers that have ever seen from a perimeter defender. This is what makes him so good at guarding bigger players. I've talked about this all the time. Bigger players, especially

shot makers, they don't see that. They don't see the hand in the face. They've practiced hitting shots with hands in their face their entire lives. What you can do, though, is you can bother their rhythm. There's an energy transfer if you can, if you calculate it, It's like if

you try to chain it all together. I should say, the handle connects to the footwork, and then when you get into the shot, that connects upwards in your energy transfer from the ground as you're jumping up through the release, and you chain all of that together through reps. You go in the gym and you just do all these reps ball handling and shooting out of all these different

bits of footwork. These post players they're looking at, oh, you're attacking as small and trying to bump you and get to my left shoulder hook or my right shoulder fade or whatever it is that they're trying to get through or a step through move something along those lines. And they practice those moves, and they practice those moves, and they practice those moves, and if you let them

get to their footwork, they're gonna make it. But if you can disrupt them, if you can stab at the basketball and disrupt the ball handling a little bit, you can bump their base and disrupt the footwork a little bit as they're jumping, If you lean on them a little bit so that they're losing a little bit of that balance as they go up into the shot on

their gather. If you swipe down and you deflect the ball a tiny bit, if you disrupt something along that chain, it will have a far greater effect on the end result than you just standing there and putting your hand up at the end after not disrupting anything else. And Drew's just really really good at that, stabbing at the ball, disrupting the base, being physical, jumping one side, then jumping all the way to the other side and try to

catch a guy off guard. He did that a few times Apollo in Franz today, like he just is an unbelievable size mismatched, and that was a huge weapon for Boston in the second half of this game. Derek White brought the volume scoring for the Celtics today and it came in the form of shot making. He had seven threes, but most of them were high degree of difficulty threes, like an extra step behind the line or against a

great contest. And again, when you're playing against great defenses like the Orlando Magic, in a high leverage situation like this, on many of your possessions, the best shot you can get is a mildly contested, slightly deeper three. And like Derek White provided that scoring pop today in a game where again, when you're playing games like that, games like the Rockets Warriors series, threes are like touchdowns, So they're literally like touchdowns because no one can score and and

Derek White just brought that today. I think this series is actually a great tune up series for the Celtics. They're not in any real danger. I mean I saw enough today to feel like Orlando can steal a game. Like I wouldn't be surprised if Orlando won a game, you know, ninety three to eighty seven down into Orlando in Game three or Game four. But they don't have

the firepower to win the series. But the Magic present real problems for the Celtics offense, and that will help them prepare for an OKC matchup should they meet in the finals. It's just great preparation for them. They just need to hope that Tatum's wrist is okay. But I think he's fine. But after the hard foul from Kcpu was just something to keep an eye on, and it was a shooting risk, which can always be a little tricky when you need Tatum to be.

the last twenty one games to end the season. They were sixteenth in offense in that span of nineteenth in defense. They're not good at anything. None of their stars is playing particularly well. They were the one team in that cluster of teams, the eight teams that made the Western Conference playoffs. They were the one team that stuck out like a sore thumb, and boy did they look like look like it today. I want to shout out the Okac Thunder first for the level of intensity that they

brought right out of the gates today. I was talking in my film session this morning about the intensity of the playoffs. I lamented that last night, teams like the Bucks and Lakers were just not ready for playoff intensity.

Before I even watched the Thunder game. Today, I was recording the film session and when we were done, we were just waiting for a filed upload, and Jackson and I were just talking and hanging out and Jackson goes like, hey, man, like, how are you feeling about the Lakers after watching that game?

to Larry O'Brian trophy. It is one through, super intense, hyper competitive basketball from day one of the NBA playoffs. And so I said in that moment to Jackson, like I am discouraged that a team that I believe in, that I believe has a real chance to win the title came out for their first playoff game and just looks completely unprepared for the intensity. That was before I watched the Thunder game, I walked out of the conversation

with Jackson, sat down on my outdoor couch. It was beautiful day here in Tucson, and I'm sitting down and I just watched Okac come out and they said, we are treating this like like the Okase has talent to coast against Memphis, they could ease their way into the second round. Fuck that, They're like, We're going to embarrass the Memphis Grizzlies today. They brought that level of intensity.

They seem abundantly clear on what is expected of them to be able to win four playoff rounds, and I just thought that was a valuable check mark in this process. They did not ease their way in. They didn't even show some of the just level of general discomfort that they showed against the Pelicans in Game one last year. They they look like a team that knows exactly what they're trying to accomplish and how great they will have

to be to get there. I even thought the Celtics came out with a little bit of like a let's beat the magic, but not over extend ourselves doing it type of energy. The Thunder did not. They met the moment and they embarrassed the Grizzlies. The run really took off with the bench group led by Kaison Wallace.

just played forty percent of their game in transition. But the thunder were also surgical in their half court playmaking. Memphis has always been an overhelp team. This is something

I've been complaining about with them for years. They consistently are aggressive in their nail help, meaning like if the guys driving off the left wing, the defender guarding the guy in the right wing will be sitting like damn near at the elbow, like on the strong side elbow, or like at the foul line, like just sitting there in like a soft double team. They'll hard low man helps, so like the guy guarding the guy in the weakside

corner will be all the way over. If you move the ball against the Grizzlies, you will get open threes. The Grizzlies allowed sixteen point four unguarded catch and shoot jump shots per game this year, which was the third most in the entire NBA, and the Thunder just made him pay for it. They consistently made simple reads in traffic generated a ton of great looks. They generated sixteen unguarded catch and shoot jump shots compared to just five for Memphis. They shot him at a super high clip.

They got one point six y nine points per jump shot on those unguarded catch and shoots. They had thirty seven assists on fifty made field goals, the Thunder were bottom five and assist percentage this year.

faced today. That's not exactly rocket science. Memphis has been a mediocre to bad basketball team for a while, but today was a test for their decision making, and they aced that test, and they did it with Shay going four for thirteen from the field. I just thought it was a statement about how ready this Thunder team is for this playoff run. On the Memphis front, I've been talking for a while about how their shot creators just aren't good enough. Jaw hasn't made a single tangible improvement

to his game in three years. Bain really struggles to create quality shots against elite defense, and Jared Jackson a complete no show today. Joh was able in his first shift to create some advantages, but he still just has that one athletic superpower and Okase was eventually able to contain him because he can't shoot. He's one for six from three and then as soon as Joah went to the bench, it was a steady died of that Scottie Pippen junior in Desmond Bain unit. They couldn't even score

and they got blitzed. If Memphis gets swept, which I think they will, they will have finished the season four teen and twenty three in their last thirty seven games. You have to think they'll be contemplating some massive changes to the roster if that happens, which.

Two days down. I'm a little tired, but this is it gets a little bit easier with each passing day. I was talking with Colin and the guys tonight. Like the first two days, that first Saturday Sunday is by far the hardest stretch of this season or of this playoff run, because it's eight games, every one of the matters,

every series is zero zero. It's your first impressions. You get to second weekend, one to eighths are not any good anymore, right Usually, like I expect Cleveland to be up three to oho, I expect the Thunder to be up three to oh. And it gets a little easier you get to the following weekend. You're getting into the second round. Now it's like there's only two games a night. You get into the conference finals. It gets a little bit easier as we go along. But man, that first

weekend is always tough. But we've made it through and we are ready to continue our process as we go through the week. I'm very, very excited to continue to get into this with you guys. I appreciate you guys for rocking with us. We're about to pass one hundred thousand subs. That's pretty fucking cool. I'm super excited about that. I have you guys to thank for that, and I can't tell you how much I guys. I appreciate you guys for supporting the show, Weekend one of the books.

I'll see you tomorrow morning for some film What so guys. As always, I appreciate you for listening to and supporting Oops tonight. They would actually be really helpful for us if you guys would take a second.