Hoops Tonight - NBA Reaction: Jokic & Nuggets UNSTOPPABLE vs. Kings, Heat-Pistons OT THRILLER

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content throughout the year. And the last but not least, keep dropping mail back questions in the YouTube comments so that we can hit them on Fridays the rest of the season. All right, let's talk some basketball. So Nuggets Kings just an absolutely wild game. My wife ended up having a girl's night with one of her friends last night, so I got to just kind of sit down by myself and watch basketball all night, and I chose two games and chose Piston's Heat and I chose Nuggets Kings,

and both of them did not disappoint. The Nuggets come out and just smack the Kings from the opening tip. They go up by as many as twenty three points, and then right at that beginning of the second quarter, Denver just completely stops playing defense and it turns into this really weird game where it's very up and down. Both teams are getting shots up within the first seven

or eight seconds of the shot clock. Kind of felt like whoever was at the point of the tack was just giving up on the first move, and both guys on both teams were responsible, but it was like it was like, if there's a ball screen, the guy would just either die on the screen, or if the guy rejected the screen, he just let him drive past, or if his a one on one move, it would just be one quick move and then downhill, and when he gets downhill, you're either just getting into whatever easy shot

along the way that you want or screaming downhill and driving help and kicking out to somebody. It just kind of felt like every team or every possession was just easy for both offenses, and Denver allows eighty two points in the second and third quarter. Twenty six of those were in transition. Tomart de Rozan was the guy kind of really started to get them going in the second quarter.

Darreon Fox and Sabonis kind of took over from there, and it was just it was just a weird game because in that entire middle portion it just felt like neither team could guard each other. It's very, very sloppy. But then Sabonis hits a three on a pick and pop with about three minutes left that puts the Kings up by eight. It's one twenty two to one fourteen. And then, in classic Denver Nuggets fashion, they score on

seven consecutive possessions to end the game. They score sixteen points in three minutes, and they get a win in Sacramento. Here's all seven of the possessions. Number one, Sabonis bites on a pump fake against Jamal Murray on the left wing. He drives past him, draws a quick falther in the penalty, knocks down two free throws. Second one, Jokic's posting up

some bonus in the middle of the floor. Russell Westbrook is in the right corner and Kean Ellis is guarding Russell Westbrook and Kean ellen this starts to kind of meander over to where Yokic is and is not paying attention to Russ. Russ smartly cuts right along the baseline. Jokic hits him, Russ gets an easy layup. I will admit that I was annoyed having rooted for Russ when

he was with the Lakers, because he would just never cut. Ever, when he was off the ball, he would just stand and wait for the ball at the three point line. And so whatever it is, he learned his lesson. Nice little baseline cut with Jokic gets a nice layup. Then this really bizarre possession where Russell Westbrook and Jamal Murray run into each other in the back court, like just

incapacitated in the back court. It's a five on three in the front court and Aaron Gordon just walks into excuse me, a three on five and Aaron Gordon just walks into an off the dribble three from like well above the brake on the left side knocks it down. It was funny because it was just like a total

Champ shot, the Nuggets were back within four. It just felt like this big momentum shot Aaron Gordon's mean muggin after the shot, and like I actually had somebody on Twitter be like that was a bad shot, and like, I technically, yeah, because it's off the dribble three for one of your worst off the dribble three point shooters.

But I actually thought it was a pretty smart shot from Aaron Gordon in retrospect, because like it was a three on five and Russ and Jamal were basically incapacitated, so like any second after that, the Kings were gonna realize they had a two man advantage and they were just gonna start doubling and swarming, and that could have turned into a really ugly possession or a turnover and a run out three or something like that run out

layup for the Kings like that. So, like, honestly, I thought it was a pretty smart shot from Aaron Gordon. And then from there we got four straight possessions of the Jamal Murray Nicole Jokich two man game, all of which ended in buckets. The first one Sabonis and Ellis switch, so Kean Ellis is guarding Jamal Sabonis is guarding Jokic. They switched the action. Jokic is now on Ellis. Jamal whips it back to Jokic at the top of the key, and then he clears out and Jokic starts posting up

Ellis right in the middle of the floor. As he posts him up, he draws a double team from Deer and Fox, who is guarding Russell Westbrook on the right wing. Now Fox and Ellis are both on Jokic and Russ is standing wide open on the wing. Jokic throws it out to Russ and then both Fox and Ellis fan out to shooters for whatever reason, leaving Jokic. So Russ just throws it right back to Jokic and Jokic hits a little floater in the lane. The next time down.

It's a Jamal Murray Nicole Jokic two man game, kind of a ball screen out like twenty five feet from the basket, and on the play, Deer and Fox was kind of overplaying the high side, meaning he was like overplaying the screen side, trying to force Jamal Murray to reject the screen. Kind of like an ice coverage, but typically in ice you want your big man dropping back to help, because you're basically conceding a dry if you overplay the screen, they can just reject the screen and

get downhill. So Bonus was glued up to Jokic. So Jamal crossed over and got dribble penetration on Darren Fox. Darren Fox tried to recover with his athleticism, but Jamal Murray, really smart gamesmanship, waited till Darren Fox got right back in front of him and then went to the step back.

And that was like the perfect time to hit that move because in that little bit of contact, it just sent Darren Fox flying because his momentum was so out of control going towards the basket, got just this completely uncontested little ten footer around the left elbow and knocks it down. Then we go to the next possession, Darren Fox goes under the pick, but on the pick, when Darren Fox goes under, Jamal Murray hesitates and just kind of throws a head fake and a hesitation dribble up

at the basket. Darren Fox takes one bad step, just literally one bad step that gets him out of position. As a result, Jamal Murray's able to get really really heavy downhill in that specific situation, because remember what happened on the previous possession when Jamal Murray rejected the screen, Sabonis did not help. He stayed glued up to Jokich at the three point line, Jamal Murray got the wide

open ten footer. This time, Sabonis sees Jamal Murray compromise Fox and hard helps right so hesitation dribble, Fox takes a bad step, Jamal gets downhill. Sabonis has to step over and help. What's wide open in that situation, Nikole Jokic popping above the break on the left side. Jamal

whips it back. Jokic had missed five threes that game, he was zero for five, but he got his legs into this one and it was right down the pipe, knocks it down, puts the Nuggets back up, and in the final possession, this crazy Jamal Murray Yokich two man game where they interchanged three separate times, a dribble handoff into a ball screen, into another dribble handoff, and finally on the third one, after defending it really well, Jokicic gets a little bit of contact on darreon Fox on

the screen, which gives Jamal Murray just enough of an edge turning the corner, he elevates right at the foul line, knocks down the jumper, and Denver gets the win. There was a crazy sequence on the final possession where Yokic came up to the level and they let Sabonis get screaming downhill on a rollman touch and both Nuggets low men stepped over and DeMar de Rosen was right there,

but Jokic had kind of recovered and Demarta rozen. If you would have just caught the ball and went up with it, he probably gets a dunk or draws a foul, but he got spooked. He got spooked by Nikolea Jokich dropping into the lane and fumbled the basketball away and Denver ends up getting a win. And honestly, what happened last night is why I can't quit the Denver Nuggets, even with their uneven start and even with their obvious

talent limitations. I just subsceen this too many times, where the Nuggets can generate such insanely high quality shots that they can literally score on you every single possession down the stretch of a game. I mean, I watched it happ into my Lakers. Remember Game two of the Nuggets series last year, the Nuggets Lakers first round series. Denver scores on nine of their last ten possessions. Like, it's just really difficult to win when a team is just

going down the floor and scoring every single time. And really it just comes down to the Yokich Murray Murray two man game, which again went four to four down the stretch in the final four possessions. Because Jokic is shooting over fifty percent from three this year, he was before the game last night. Jokic is hitting half as threes, so that's not a shot you can really concede. There isn't a shot that you can concede in the Jokich two man game that isn't gonna go in about fifty

percent of the time. Like, Okay, you leave Jokic open on the pop. He's hitting about half of his threes this year, and that's worth an extra point. Okay, Well what if we just let Jamal Murray shoot coming off the screen. That's kind of what the Kings did on the final possession. Well, when Jamal Murray's right, he's hitting that shot about half the time. Okay, Well, what if we show at the level to stop Jamal from coming off and shooting. All right, well, he's just gonna throw

the pocket past to Jokic. Jokic hits the floater in that pocket about seventy percent of the time. Okay, you want to switch it. Oh, well, now you have Keon Ellis on Jokic. He's backing him down, drawing a double team and dropping it off to a cutter. Or he's gonna little hit a little hook shot over the top that he's gonna hit seventy percent of the time. The point is is there's just no answer for the Jokich Murray two man game other than to just send a

third defender over. And yeah, that's easier now than it used to be for the Nuggets when they had Contaviouskbwopope and everyone was kind of playing at a higher level, But that's still not a great option. They did that and Russell Westbrook cuts on the baseline and gets an easy layup. So yeah, like there's just not really an option to make that anywhere uncomfortable for the Denver Nuggets.

And with Jokics playing at the level that he's playing again, I actually thought so Bonus outplayed Jokis for the majority of the game last night. But that's what the all time greats do, even on their off nights, even when they don't really have it, They kind of just find a way to get the job done and make a few plays down the stretch and get out of there

within and that's what Jokic did. But with the yok with the level that Jokic is playing at, if you give him a partner that can be a real threat in the two man game, they're just borderline impossible to stop on offense when they're in the half court. And that's why I can't quit them, and that's why I still view them as a championship threat even with all their limitations. This was a huge win for the Nuggets

on several levels. One, it's their third in a row after they had dropped five and eight, so it's kind of like a good momentum builder for him, a little pallet cleanser. Two, that twenty eight points from Jamal Murray matches his season high, and he's starting to build some momentum. He's averaging twenty points per game over his last seven games. And then three, you demonstrated that the Jokich Murray two man game is still a reliable staple in this league.

It was a big step forward for the Denver Nuggets last night. Just need to clean up that defensive effort in that middle portion of the game they can be in better shape. I also wanted to shout out Russell Westbrook. I thought he was really good on the offensive end last night. He got absolutely fried by Malik Monk and Darren Fox on the other end, but everybody got fried in this game. Like there wasn't a player that and get fried in this game. So I'm not going to

be too critical of that. But I thought Russ was really really good for them on offense at multiple portions of the game. Again, more activity off ball than you typically see from him. Really really good creation in the non Yolkic groups, just with rim pressure. A lot of really good looks that he set up Jokic with because of his ability to get downhill in their two man game. Really nice work in the start. I think they're five

and one now. When Russell Westbrook starts, he's again when you can afford when you pay him four million instead of forty million, and when he's more willing to play a role on a team. You can get some real positive impact out of Russ and he's been better than I expected him to be so far this year for the Nuggets. On the Kings front, there's so much fun to watch. They play so fast, they're very difficult to guard. No one can keep Dearon Fox from getting to his spots.

He's playing at an insanely high level this year. He's torched the Nuggets over and over again. In crunch time last night, Sabonus is such a great connective center. He was great all game, even dropped a beautiful pass a de rozen that might have won the game had Drozen up fumblded away, and then DeRozan carried them for large portions of that game. He was a big part of how they got back into it. Had a big clutch bucket too on just like a baseline rip on a catch.

It's kind of this weird sequence. Jokic's been burned by this a few times this year, where like he's helping off of the strong side corner and he sits just a little too high, and I actually wonder if it's a game plan thing, because Derozean caught an immediately ripped baseline and Joki has given up that a few times this year, but he got a big dunk on the baseline, big play from Derozane. They're fun team. The biggest issue with the Kings right now is their ability to find

lineups that actually balance defense and offense. So, for instance, when they play Sabonis, Fox, Monk, and DeRozan together, they are really scoring a one to twenty one offensive rating, but in those groups they can't guard a one to eighteen defensive raiding right, and you saw that pop to

the surface last night. But we've also seen large samples because of injuries to Malik, Munken, deer and Demart Derozen, we've seen large samples of more defensive groups around Fox and Sabonis, And in those groups they have a one zho six defensive rating, which is great, that's amazing, but they have only a one oh seven offensive rating in that group, which is terrible. And so that's really the

biggest issue with this roster build. When you build the roster around guys like Deeron, like Malik, Monk and Demarta Rosen, who are legitimate one way players, like they are really high level offensive players that are just not going to do all that much fighting or competing on the defensive end of the floor. And then you have Sabonis who fights and competes on the defensive end but doesn't really

have the ability. And then you have deeron Fox, who has the ability but has such a big offensive burden that it's hard to expect him to be an elite defensive player. He was really bad at the point of attack against Jamal Murray and crunch time last night, right, Like, but it's just a lot to ask because he's the guy who's got to generate the offense on the other

end of the floor. But like, that's the thing is, like there's a lot of guys on this roster that either specialize in playing defense or specialize in playing offense. And if you can't put groups together that have guys that are willing to play on both ends of the floor, you're going to continue to have a lot of up and down results like the Kings have had all season this year. It's the most wonderful time of the year for getting in on all of the hoops, football, and

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Age and eligibility varies by jurisdiction void in Ontario. Bet must win to receive award. Bonus. Bets expire one hundred and sixty eight hours after issuance for additional turns and responsible gaming resources to dkang dot Co. Slash b Ball, the Heat Pistons game just another wild game. So Bam hits a three above the break on the left wing, kind of a concession three at the beginning, and it puts the Heat up three and they never let again. In regulation, Kay Cunningham was doing a lot of work

early in the game, attacking Tyler Harrow screening actions. When he gets switches, he'd take him to the block. He'd either draw a double team and kick out to a shooter, or he'd just shoot that little left shoulder hook over the top of Tyler Harrow or Miami started trying to hedge, meaning like have Tyler Harrow cut off Kad Cunningham's drive and then try to rotate. But then Kate started beating him by hitting the guy slipping out of that screen.

A lot of early success for them with those actions, and then the Heat offense was sputtering early. Tyler Harrow was missing some good looks in the early part of the game. Jimmy wasn't very aggressive in the first few minutes of the game, so the Pissons end up taking a little bit of a lead. Kid did a lot of damage to the Heat with his passing, beating basic overhelp like he burned Jimmy Butler for helping off of Maligue Beasley a few times skip passes in ball screens.

But he also did a ton of damage in transition, like kick ahead passes to rim runners, kick ahead passes to guys running in transition, and kind of like looping along the backside, kickhead passes to shooters run in the wing. He hit Simon Fontechio with the three on the left wing, and the first half is a nice little bit of four shadowing for what ended up happening in overtime, which we'll get to in a little bit. But the Pistons

basically controlled things throughout. They survived all of Spolster's weirdness, They survived the zone that the Heat went to, and they tried to slow things down. They survived the full court presses that sort of thing, but then when they were up by nineteen with eight minutes left, they started to get really sloppy. Miami kept playing hard, and then things kind of went off the rails a few sloppy turnovers. Caide got ripped out by half court. They turned it

over against Miami's full court press. One time, Simone Fotechio threw a kickout pass out of bounds when Malik Beasley was kind of relocating up the wing, and then they just completely let go of the rope on defense, like Tim Hardaway Junior had two possessions of really lazy defense against Tyler Harrow in one on one situations and he got like an easy mid range jump shot and an easy little eurostep floater. More foreshadowing because it kind of

helped Tyler Harrow get a rhythm. And Tim Hardaway was just not playing good defense on those possessions, and then some really bad transition defense not running getting to the rim. Jalen Duran had a really bad one in that stretch where he was just jogging up the floor as they gave up a layup. I think to Terry Rogier if I remember correctly, but Miami started to cut the lead down and then suddenly it turned into like a single

digits game. And then two things happened from there. Tyler Harrow, who was off all night again other than those two shots at Tim hard that he got on Tim Hardaway Junior there a few minutes prior, just gets unconsciously hot for a couple of minutes. Hit three straight really really difficult movement threes, one off the dribble, two off of the run that ended up the last one ended up

tying the game and sending it to overtime. And again like rhythm is connective, Like I'm a big believer that, like if you let him get comfortable with a couple easy ones, he starts to confidence. That's a big part of how he ends up making big ones later. It's why you have to stay attentive throughout the entirety of the game and why it's so dangerous to get lazy

at the end. And then while Tyler Harrow was hitting those shots on the other end of the floor of the Pistons offense really start stalled out, in large part because of a Star Thompson. Jimmy Butler was guarding usar Thompson for most of clutch time at the end of regulation and was just ignoring him and roaming around helping on CAID. And one of the things Asar did which is a problem and he's gonna have to learn about this, he was just parking himself in the weak side corner

and not moving. Jalen Duran was setting what's called pinin flares. So basically Jimmy Butler is guarding Usar Thompson ignoring him to go help on CAD. Jalen Duran is backscreening his own man to make it so that he can't close out to Asar Thompson on the skip pass. And they did hit that skip pass once, but Kay didn't want to throw it. You know why Kate didn't want to throw it because Asar Thompson is a mediocre at best shooter, and so it's not what you want down the stretch.

You don't want to have Usar Thompson shooting threes. And so this is where he needs to make better use of his talents as a cutter in those situations instead of sitting in the weak side corner and waiting on that pin and flare in the past to come over the top. Just flash flash to the high post. If you flash to the high post and you make yourself available, you'll catch as soon as you can. You turn and face the rim. When you turn and face the rim,

Jalen Duran's man is probably going to step up. If he doesn't, you just shoot that little floater right in front of the rim and you have a two on one to get to the offensive glass. If he does show, you're dropping it off to Jalen Duran for a dunk. Make yourself available, cut move without the basketball. That's much better use of your athleticism than to just go stand in the corner where you're basically cutting the Miami Heat a break. The Pistons in general were very stagnant down

the stretch of this game. Every time Caid was looking to attack a matchup, everyone was just standing around. Even on the possession where Cad did score at the end of regulation, the two free throws that he hit, it was a play where Drew Smith I think he was attacking Jimmy. Drew Smith was on Asar Thompson, completely ignores Lasar Thompson and goes in double teams. Cade just happens to trip over him and he ends up getting two foul shots, but like it was really stagnant, not a

lot of movement. As I was watching the game, I was like, I bet you the Detroit Pistons are really bad cutting team. I went to Synergy and yes they are. They are twenty sixth in made baskets off of cuts this year. That's a sign that they need to just really improve their off ball movement. In overtime, Miami really

methodically walked them down, actually went up by eight. But our second bit of foreshadowing comes into the occasion because all night long, Cad Cunningham had been throwing these beautiful kick ahead passes. In transition, he hits Tim Hardaway Junior on the left wing, who just rises up into a long like twenty seven footer and he nails it. All night long, Caate had been beating nail help and overhelp

with swing passes. The second Tim Hardaway Junior three, Cad drives Tim Hardaway Junior's man helps at the nail kickout passes. Tim knocks down the three. That's the second one, and then the third one another transition kickhead three on the left wing that Tim Hardaway Junior hits just a textbook example of just hunting the hot hand and just taking the easy opportunities that were available there In transition, Bang bang bang. All of a sudden, Detroit is up by

one point. Jimmy gets the lead back on a put back after Bam misses this really weird kind of fadeaway that I just don't know why he took. But then Caid makes a really nice read on a Terry Rogier a drive against Terry Rozier. It's kind of an interesting play because I believe Jimmy was fixing his shoe, so he's in the back court, so it's like a five

on foward for the Pistons. On offense, Caid starts to drive down the right lane line and Tim Hardaway Junior is wide open on the left wing, and Malik Beasley is wide open on the right wing, and Bam had a bio's in help, and BAM's like Tim just hit three threes, so he's kind of lingering back towards Tim's side and as a result, he's just a step late. Cad identifies it, gets into Rogier's body and goes right

to the rim and makes a little bank shot. Bam tries to come over and block it at the end, but he's just a step late because he was worried about that. Tim Hardaway junior piece really really smart read from Cad to take an easy two right at the rim rather than leaving it to shot variance at that point. And then Tyler Harrow missed a couple of easy looks down the stretch, and the Pistons ended up getting a win. Kind of felt like the right team won, like the

Pistons outplayed them all night. There was just two crazy shooting streaks, right, like Harrow goes crazy hot and turns the surefire loss into an overtime win, and then Hardaway gets super hot and turns the Surefire loss in overtime to a Detroit win. But on the Detroit front, I thought, I thought this was a great example of how much the internal improvement is going to help the Pistons in

the long run. I heard Kaden op presser, I think it was I think it was actually right after the game last night, but he was talking about how you can still get so much better, and he was talking about how when he watches film, he just constantly see things that like, man, I should have just done that, or I should have just done this, and it's like He's right, he still has so much to improve on, Like he had a couple of turnovers in the final five minutes of the fourth quarter, he lost track of

Jimmy Butler on a double team where he kind of like spun back into him, or just his floor awareness wasn't there, missed a couple of easy mid rangers down the stretch, and regulation, Like, there's a lot of things that he's gonna continue to get better at as time goes on. Asar Thompson learning how to be a threat off the ball, like we talked about, like screening and

cutting instead of always spotting up. Cade, by the way, can really help with this coaching on the floor, like hey, come on, man, flash to the high post, make yourself available. We can do this easier. Jalen Duran just being sharper with his running habits, like staying on those details throughout the game. They just need a few more years of playing serious basketball to cut more and more of those mistakes out. And then lastly, you can see the natural

fit of off ball scoring with Cade. All night long, Malik Beasley and Tim Hardaway Junior were capitalizing on really smart kickout rads from Caid cutting am this is why I've been talking about them drafting off ball scores. This is where as they slip down the draft order as

they start to win more and more games. When you get start picking in that seven to fifteen range, that's where you have to start hunting the off ball scoring types, the six to seven to six to nine role players who at the D one level I've just been taking catch and shoot threes, driving closeouts, and competing on the defensive end of the flour. Those are the types of guys they need to be hunting now to complement the

on ball scoring provided by Cad and Jaden. Again, just supplementing with those types of off ball scorers to kind of anchor them on the offensive end of the floor. On the Miami Front, forget about all the wildness and crunch time. They just couldn't guard Detroit in the first three quarters. They got absolutely shredded in ball screens, they got absolutely shredded in transition, and then on the other end,

they weren't really generating quality looks. Yeah, they went twelve for forty three from three, but they only generated ten unguarded catch and shoot jump shots in that whole game. They typically generate fourteen which is top ten in the league, but they were not generating them last night. But there are two pieces of upside I have for Heat fans. One,

Tyler Harrow just continues to hit shots. Yes, he had a bad shooting night overall, but again, he hit five touch shots in the late fourth quarter that sent the game to overtime. That's a real hot streak. I mean, that's what's what's that thirteen points? Like it just on shot making there down the stretch and on the season now, like he's over forty one percent from three on over ten attempts per game. Both are career highs a career high forty eight percent from the field, a career high

sixty three percent for shooting. It's six point two percent higher than his previous career high. He's their most reliable and dependable offensive player, which is crazy because it simply did not use to be the case. Very very optimistic sign for the Miami Heat's future. Good timing too, because I think this is a real pivot point for them and Jimmy Butler just massively increased his trade value last night.

If a team like Phoenix or a team like Golden State was on the fence, Jimmy just dropped a thirty five nineteen to ten. Several huge buckets late did a lot to help Miami get a chance to win that game. Five steals in blocks in that game. Just such a high impact player, a couple of pieces of upside for the Miami Heat. All right, guys, that's all I have for today. As always, as sincerely appreciate you guys for

supporting me and supporting the show. We'll be back tomorrow with a breakdown of the nd Season Tournament championship game. I'll see you guys. Then the volume