Hoops Tonight - Steph Curry & Warriors blown out, Lakers lose vs. Mavs, Knicks edge Nuggets

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six seven three six nine In New York. Dial one eight hundred five two two forty seven hundred in Wyoming, or visit www dot one eight hundred gambler dot net in West Virginia. All right, welcome to Hoops Tonight, presented by FanDuel here at the volume. Happy Sunday, everybody. I hope all of you guys are having a great weekend so far. Enjoyed a couple of good nights away from the game of basketball, but I'm excited to dive back into it. We're gonna hit three games from the last

two nights. The Golden State Warriors dropping their eleventh consecutive game against the Memphis Grizzlies, who were super impressive on both ends of the floor. So I want to spend some time talking about the Grizzlies. Today, the Los Angeles Lakers lost a heartbreaker to the Dallas Mavericks on the back of Maxi kleiba In an awesome fourth quarter from Kyrie Irving. We're gonna dive into that game from the perspective of both teams. And then, last but not least,

we're gonna go over the Eastern Conference. The New York Knicks won their third consecutive game in very impressive fashion over the Denver Nuggets. So lots of good basketball to get into. You guys know the drill. Before we get started, subscribed to the Volumes YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore Jason lt so you guys don't miss anyhow announcements.

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tickets lowest price guaranteed. All right, let's talk some basketball. So Memphis just absolutely bludgeoned Golden States defense last night. They scored one hundred and thirty three points. They shot fifty five percent from the field, forty seven percent from three, and that's sixty points in the paint. And you know, it's interesting because the Grizzlies have always been good without John Morant, but usually it's because of the physicality areas

of the game. This is a great defensive team. John Morant is one of the weakest defensive links in the entire league. So when you take him out of the equation and put a bigger, stronger guard in entirest Jones into that spot, and when you're playing more wing talent, you're just gonna get a better, more physically imposing team.

But what's been really impressive in this particular run, and they're five and three since John Morant went out, is offensively, they've been getting a lot of high level production from guys. Ty's Jones has been amazing. He's got excellent pick and pop chemistry with Jaron Jackson Junior that we're gonna get to in a little bit. Desmond Bain has been playing at extremely high level. Dylan Brooks is finally starting to hit some shots after a rough start to the season.

He hit a bunch of huge threes in this particular game to swing things on the offensive end of the floor. And so with everything that they're getting out of that group, they're actually scoring at a pretty damn effective level. Jaron Jackson Junior thirty one points last night, hating threes, attacking closeouts. Like I said, he was running that picking pop with Tys Jones a lot, and what it's helping there is

he's attacking guys like Kevan Luni with an advantage. And when Kevon Luny, you know, one of the things that he's a very good defensive player, but one of the things that he doesn't do a lot is have to close out to shooters and it's just completely different footwork. And Jaren Jackson has been really good driving clothesouts this year and getting into the lane. He scored ten points justin pick and pop stuff with Tys Jones in this game.

And you know, since John Morant went down, they've needed extra scoring punch out of him, and he's been great, shooting fifty percent from the field in averaging twenty two points per game, up from his typical average, which is around seventeen. Right, So everybody's stepping up and they're really impressive on both ends of the floor right now. You know, when I was watching the film this morning, the most impressive thing to me was Memphis's interior defense. You know,

a lot of Golden State's actions. You know, we always talk about Steph's gravity, but it's kind of like their whole system in the form and the gravity that it generates between Steph Clay and Jordan Pool, where guys are flying off these dribble handoffs and off ball actions and you get a lot of slips to the rim for guys of Kavan Looney, for guys like Draymond Green, and for guys like Jonathan Cominga right, but like all night long,

Jaren Jackson, Junior Xavier Tillman just digging down at the basketball, disrupting things before they go up to the rim, then contesting high above the rim. They help. This is a crazy stat. Golden State missed twenty six shots just in the paint in this game. They were twenty two for forty eight on field goal attempts in the paint in this game. That is an insane level of defensive impact

from Memphis front court. And again, you gotta remember that's with most of their defense extended out to the three point line, dealing with all the Golden States shooters. So like, the job that those two guys did cleaning up everything around the basket was extremely impressive in this game. Jared Jackson junior man, every single month just takes a little bit of a step towards becoming that perennial All Star that we know he's going to be. So, you know,

shout out to Memphis, like I good. Like, here's the thing, Memphis is not my favorite team. You know, like, I really don't like Dylan Brooks. I have no patience for somebody who actively tries to hurt basketball players. And I've seen a lot of Memphis fans be like, oh, but it's like Draymond No, no no, no, Draymond has a lot of hard fouls in his career and he's done some jankie stuff, but it's not the same Draymond Green was never going to clothesline a guy on a breakaway dunk

and break his elbow. That's just Dylan Brooks. Draymond Green isn't gonna deliberately do extra barrel rolls on the ground to roll up into a guy's ankles and knees. That's just Dylan Brooks. You know. Draymond Green is never going to shove a cameraman for no particular reason other than to just be an asshole. That's a Dylan Brooks thing. So don't compare those two guys to me. They're not

the same. Like, yeah, yeah, Draymond's a little bit of a He's a guy that plays an extremely physical brand of basketball and he does some jankie stuff that's outside of the rules, not in the same stratosphere as what Dylan Brooks does, So stop comparing them. You know, don't like Dylan Brooks. Yeah, it bothers me that they talk a bunch of shit for a team that hasn't really accomplished much. So there are some things that I dislike about the team, But I'm not like a just a

blind hater. I know they're good. I know Memphis can play. Their defense is an incredible foundation for them to build on over the course of the next couple years. My pessimism surrounding them as a playoff team set stems from just the way that I look at basketball teams and what I think they need to be good at to succeed in the playoffs. I think you need to be excellent defensively, particularly in the front court. They have that

box resoundingly checked. Jaron Jackson Junior to me, is absolutely a guy who can be a foundational defensive piece for a championship team. You need to have excellent perimeter defense. Dylan Brooks has been doing a number on stars around the league all season long. They've got that checked. Really, John Morand, is that one little weak entry point, But I don't think that necessarily would be enough to get

them beat if they had everything else checked. The reason why I'm not super high on Memphis is shot creation. Their half court shot creators are a little bit limited. Yes, John Morand's really really good, Desmond Bain's really good. Ties Shones is really good. In every playoff series in the later rounds, they're going to be going against higher level

shot creators, that's an issue. And then off ball, they just they're one of the worst spot up teams in the league, so their shot creators are generating shots for guys that can't knock them down. They are less than a point per possession on spot up possessions this year, that's twenty sixth in the league. So yeah, I dislike Memphis,

but I also think they're good. But at the same time, like, I don't put them in that list of eight teams that can potentially win the title simply because I don't think they have the shot creation or the off ball shot finishing to be able to score well enough to win the title. I look at them as Cleveland of the Western Conference, Like, yes, if John Morant goes absolutely insane in the playoffs, they have a chance to win,

but it's extremely slim. If Donovan Mitchell and Darius Garland go absolutely insane in the playoffs, they have a chance to win, but it's very slim. And Cleveland has more shot creation and is better as a spot up team. So like, I actually think Cleveland's a better version of Memphis in the West. So yeah, I'm not a fan of the Grizzlies, but there's a basketball reason why I

feel the way that I feel about them. On the Warriors front, it was a frustrating game because they really competed, and you know, they got within two in the fourth quarters one o eight, one oh six, and then Dylan Brooks comes down and takes and makes a transition pull up three that sucks. It happens big time shot. Like I said, Dylan Brooks was a huge swing factor in

this game on the offensive end of the floor. But then there were two absolutely critical errors from Jordan Pool from the one eleven one oh six point that I thought costs the Warriors the game. There was a play where at one eleven one oh six where Jordan Pool gets Downhill, drives to the basket and Clay Thompson is wide open in the left corner, like just completely unguarded.

Desmond Bain I believe, is guarding Steph on this particular play, panics and leaves and is like going to Clay because he thinks he's gonna get that shot, and he would have been too late. If Jordan would have made the past, he would have knocked it down. But instead Jordan throws up this like crazy wild left handed layup that had no chance of going in Clay Thompson's super discouraged kind of jogs back in transition defense that down the other end, I think Luke Kennard gets a wide up and three.

He misses it, but David Roddy gets an offensive rebound in large part because they're not matched up, and he gets fouled under the rim and he makes one of the free throws could two possessions later, Jordan Poole just dribbles the ball at the floor on the right wing and just throws an aimless skip pass across the court and gets picked off and goes the other way for Desmond Bayd to hit a three in the corner, which

effectively was the dagger. Steph hit a three after that, but then Desmond Baine hit a three right after that where Steph kind of ran into Dylan Brooks and Dillon Brooks like fell on the ground almost into Clay Thompson's legs, so Clay Thompson stopped running, Steph is looking at the refs instead of paying attention, and Desmond band comes off free and clear and hits a three. They just were so not sharp in the details defensively in this game.

But those two, those two a rim read from Jordan Pool and that skip pass I thought were the two play because it was right there for the taking. And again, like with the Jordan Pool thing, I've always said, like his limitations just come to the surface in a bigger way when you're dealing with issues with personnel. When you have your full roster, you can contend with some of those issues. But when the when the personnel limitations are there,

Jordan Poole's decision making issues come to the surface. Jordan Poole's issues defense and in defense and rebounding situations, they come to the surface more. It's it's just, it's just the unfortunate reality of their predicament. Like I mean, I told you guys this from the beginning. I I know how what this core is capable of. But when you take Andrew Wiggins out of the equation, and you take Gary Payton out of the equation, they are too small

and too unathletic to consistently win on the road. At home, they just play with a ferocity in front of their home crowd that can overcome those issues to a certain extent. But on the road they can't match that effort differential in the personnel issues shine to the surface. And you know, here's the thing. I can never write them off completely

because they're gonna be in the play. And my guess is it's gonna end up being something like Lakers Warriors, kind of similar to twenty twenty one where they're Lakers Warriors playing in that seven eight playoff game. That's just my guess. But like they're you know, I can't completely write them off because as long as that group is there,

we know what they're capable of. And if Andrew Wiggins comes back, you know, like I've heard, I've heard some Warriors fans complaining about the vibes, and yeah, they're bad vibes. The team doesn't seem happy. Everyone seems pissed at Jordan Pool. Everyone's you know, showing bad body language. But that's just everyone overreacts to that stuff. Who likes to lose basketball games? Seriously, show me, show me the person who likes to lose

basketball games. They've lost six out of eight. They're not going to be running around Stoke tie fiving each other and acting all happy. That's not how it works. And like, yeah, if if Andrew Wiggins comes back before the end of the season and they win two three games in a row, all the energy of the team is going to turn over.

That That's why I can't completely write them off. But make no mistake, it looks bleak because there's certainly no word coming that Andrew Wiggins is on his way back like they're they're hoping, but there's no there's nothing substantial there. They're only one and a half games up on the eleventh seed, so they could just as easily miss the play in if they don't come together and win some games. And looking at their schedule, there's some easy ones in there,

but there's also some hard ones. At Houston. Houston's beating everybody right now. They just beat the Pelicans and the Lakers and the Celtics back to back to back at home. They're hard to beat in Houston. You're playing on the road. They're a big they're a lot more athletic on the perimeter than you think, and they actually present some physical mismatches they're gonna be That's not an easy game. I'd pick Golden State to win, but that's not an easy

game at Dallas. Now that Kyrie Irving's back and playing, Now that Maxi Kleiba's back in point, Maxie's be back for a little while, but Maxie clee but just kinda we're gonna talk about this a little bit with Dallas when we talk about the Lakers. But he resolves just enough of their front court issues on both ends of the floor to make them a serious basketball team, even though I don't think they can win the title, like they're not. That's not an easy game. Okay, then you

come home, but who do you play? Philly? That's not an easy game. Then Minnesota and maybe if you're lucky, Anthony Edwards is still out with an ankle injury at that point and you still have a chance to win that game. Then Pels and Spurs. So there's three easy wins there at home probably, But then you go right back on the road to Denver, not an easy game. Then you have Oklahoma City at home, that's probably a win. But then you go to Sacramento, not an easy game.

To Portland, not an easy game. Maybe if you get lucky, Sacramentos resting players in that game, but like, look, they could just as easily go below five hundred in that stretch if they don't get it together. Everything comes down to Wiggins as it pertains to their ceiling. But they're never getting to that ceiling if they can't secure a playoff spot. And they aren't securing a playoff spot unless they just lock in and win some of these games. They've got to get a few of these games, all right,

Let's move on to MAVs Lakers. So the MAVs win one eleven to one ten. Kyrie was just unbelievable in this game, especially down the stretch, making reads and making little floaters and getting to the basket and drawing free throw attempts. He had thirty eight, six and six. On the other end of the floor, the Lakers were running

good stuff. But Danel they it's so funny and this is just shot result, man, like some of this stuff, some of this stuff is just the way it shakes out over an eighty two games season, right Like D'Angel Russell got several wide open shots in the fourth quarter of this game. He just couldn't make a single one of them. And then down the stretch of the game, in spite of all that, because Dennis Schroeder made some big plays, you know, Anthony Davis made a couple of

big plays. They were defending well. They were still up by four with less than a minute left, and three crucial mistakes from Anthony Davis cost them the game, losing Maxi Cliba off ball and making a reckless close out. We talked about this a lot. You know, in that Minnesota game against Brooklyn. If you like a week ago execution wins and loses basketball games, you know, it's funny.

I've I've played in so many basketball games in my life, at so many different levels, and every time you lose a game, it haunts you, right, And when I think back to games that I've lost in my life, that what haunts me is always a little thing. It's always like a miss box out here, or like one play towards the end where you didn't quite sprint back in transition and you gave up a layup, or you know, a bad foul, a miss defensive rotation, a play where you had a chance to make a play and maybe

you held back. There's always these little things that end up swinging basketball games. It's one of my favorite things about the game of basketball. I love that complex nature of it. I love that chess match. But like it can be painful, it can cost you. And we talked about against in that Minnesota Brooklyn game overhelping on contained drivers. A contested shot has significantly less value than an uncontested shot,

regardless of where it is at the floor. These are pros, they make them so if you if Rudy Gobert is contesting a really tough spencer, didn't what he stepped through, You've got a better chance getting a stop there. Then if you overhelp and give a wide open shot to Roy Soneil like we talked about, or when Rudy Gobert helped off of Dorian Phinney Smith, that cost them a game that they should have won. And you saw the

same thing in this Lakers game. The Lakers played better, they were in position to win up forward less than a minute left, containing the ball, they had Kyrie corralled, but they abandoned Maxi Kleber twice off the ball Anthony Davis, and he's one of the best. He's one of the best defensive players in the history of the league. So it's just bizarre. And that's what makes it such a brutal loss for the Lakers. Was you do everything right,

and it wasn't a personnel shortcoming. It wasn't you did everything right, but then they stuck their center on Russell Westbrook and suddenly you couldn't score and you lost. It wasn't you did everything right, but you generated high quality shots for bad shooters, and so personnel no, no no, no, you had all the right guys, You did all the right things in your very best player toasted the game away at the end with three mistakes. It's just it's

super unfortunate. He fouls Maxi Kleba on a three at the top of the key. Maxie goes the line, makes all three underrated element of that. Maxie Cleban makes all three of those free throws. He gets his rhythm and he's now practiced his release three times immediately before the game winning shot. Then on the final possession, Kyrie is

double teamed. The only open asses the skip pass and Anthony Davis drops way down into the lane, leaves maxically bow but just eerily reminiscent to the game they lost against the Pacers earlier this year, when Lebron James made the exact same mistake and overhelped on a contained ball handler, leaving I believe Andrew Nemhart wide open on the left wing, I will say, on the Dallas front. You know, obviously Kyrie brings in that shot. Creation again it Kyrie's won

a lot of games. I think this is at least the third that I can think of this year where Kyrie's won a game without Luca because of what he can do as a shot creator. Like it's just so funny to me how every time we have discussions about Kyrie Irving, everyone just massively glosses over just how damn good he is at basketball, Like he outplayed Anthony Davis

last in that game. I said, just as an idea with Colin Coward, if Anthony Davis got hurt, they might have to consider using him to get Kyrie, and everyone lost their freaking mind. And I don't. I wouldn't even necessarily do that. I was just pitching that as like, hey, like, if any gets hurt three years in a row, maybe flipping him for a star wouldn't be the end of the world, because you're like, you're not getting a star. You never get a star. You always get picks and

young prospects, like whatever it is you do. Even if you want to say that I'm wrong, and you know what, for the record, I probably wouldn't do that. I was just presenting the idea. But at least can we be honest in the conversation. Kyrie's freaking good, man, He's really really good, and that's what he's capable of as a

ceiling raising player. A couple that with Maxi Kleibo, which gives you just a really good defensive front court player that can guard switches onto the perimeter and can guard big, strong forwards, can compete in the physicality areas of the game, and a legitimate pick and pop threat on the other end of the floor. Just bringing him back into the fold, I think it's been about a month that he's been

back now. Just bringing him back into the fold just makes so many things make sense for Dallas on both ends of the floor. Again, it's not enough. They have massive depth issues on the front line that will cost them. I do not think this team can win a championship, but just getting Kleiba back and having him play like that on both ends of the flour just kind of

makes everything makes sense more for Dallas. I want to talk a little bit about Anthony Davis for a minute, because, like, this is the Lakers have lost three out of four now, and this is what it went This is what went down. He got resoundingly outplayed by Julius Randall and mightily struggled in the fourth quarter against Isaiah Hartenstein in a loss against the Knicks. At the time, I kind of glossed

over it. Why because he had been playing great pulling into that stretch, right, and so it was just like, hey, like eighty had a bad night, first bad night in a while, Let's not think too much about it. Denny goes into New Orleans and just obliterates the Pelicans, has like twenty points in the first half, just kills him. Then he has to sit out a game against Houston,

which directly costs them a game. They give up seventy something points in the paint, and then he botches the end against Dallas, and all of that adds up to one in three. And here's the problem. Everyone else in the West is flopping all over the place, losing games, Clippers losing games, Warriors losing games, Minnesota losing games. Everyone's losing.

And so there's like, if Anthony Davis plays against Houston and they win that game and he doesn't make those mistakes against Dallas, the Lakers are now the sixth seed. They would be the sixth seed right now with a favorable upcoming schedule and be in great position to avoid the play in and like, lucky for them, they still have a chance because everyone keeps losing and they might still get up there, but they are blowing opportunities here. And what's unfortunate is a lot of this is coming

down to Anthony Davis. And you know, it's funny. I was talking with some of the guys on my team here at the volume, just kind of like bouncing the idea of kind of players that remind me of Anthony Davis, because it's such a bizarre experience comes to La and in twenty twenty, just start to finish dominance. From game one to when they hoisted the trophy, Anthony Davis was fantastic the whole damn time. I think I ranked him the fourth best player in the world at that point,

and he deserved that recognition. He was incredible. His defensive performance in Game six of the NBA Finals was one of the best defensive games I've ever seen a player play. Completely shut Miami's water off. But since then, it's been a recurring theme, these escalations and then a complete drop off. There's no maintaining that top level of play. Two thousand and one, or excuse me, two twenty one. He gets back in time for the playoffs, just obliterates Phoenix twice

in the playoffs. You're up two games to one. You're in great shape, ad they just have no answer for Anthony Davis, and then he pulls us growing can't finish the series. Twenty twenty two is just a disaster of injuries. Here's how bad two twenty two was. Aidie never even managed to score thirty points three games in a row, which is something he's done three times already this year, but comes back into two twenty three, gets up to that ceiling twice he did earlier this season and just recently,

but he can't stay there. Earlier this year culminating in a fifty point game in Washington, just a month of just incredibly dominant MVP level basketball. Then he leaves the next game sick. Then he gets into foul trouble against Joel Ebid and really struggles, actually has a chance to win that game at the line, misses another clutch free throw, and then he gets hurt and misses a month and a half. So we got there and just couldn't stay there.

And then again this recent stretch, dominant nine and four post trades, playing great basketball, and then you drop three out of four games because you get badly outplayed by two inferior players against the Knicks can't even play on the back to back in a must win game against Houston, and crucial mistakes down the stretch, not paying attention to cost you a game the other night against Alice, and so it's like he gets there, but he just can't

stay there. And it's it's really bizarre because like I can't think of another player that I have seen come through the NBA that they're ceiling. Is best player in the world, but no team would probably take him as a foundational piece to try to win a championship because he can't stay there. So it's it's a really interesting conundrum. Again, they'd be the sixth seed right now if they get

two of those games. It's not over. Like I said, they still have plenty of chance opportunity here down the stretch. Like I said, Golden State has no wings because of Andrew Wiggins, They're gonna keep falling. Their schedule is tough. Dallas, Yeah, Maxie Cleeb was playing great, but they don't want the front court depth. Anthony Edwards just sprained his ankle. That helps on the Minnesota front although hopefully he's not out for too long because I really want to see Minnesota

play in a playoff series. Oklahoma City keeps resting Jalen Williams and Shake Hill just Alexander randomly as like a pseudo tank job. But they're not going to gain any ground on that group unless Anthony Davis gets it together. And this isn't even a health issue. He's just not playing well enough. He needs to get back up to that level. And there's a specific reason why I think the Lakers have to finish at least eighth. One gives

you two chances at the plan. If you're in the eight seed or the seventh seed and you lose that game, you get another chance. If you're in the nine ten, it's single elimination from the Star and you have to win two games, so it's a significant better position. Also, if you win the seven eight matchup, then you get to play the two seat, which is likely going to be Sacramento in a much easier opponent in the first round than Denver. In my opinion, they're one of the

worst defensive teams in the league. And if you can get up to seven, you get home court for that playing game, and if you get up to six, you get out of it entirely. So there is still a lot of incentive for the Lakers to try to claw their way up that stretch of the standings, and I'm curious to see if they can put it together. All right, let's move over to the Eastern Conference a little bit. The New York Knicks beat the Nuggets one sixteen to

one ten yesterday. Super interesting game is chess match down the stretch on both ends of the floor. When the Knicks had the ball, they were relentlessly attacking Jamal Murray Nikola Yok, which was actually doing a really nice job and drop coverage protecting the rim. In this particular game, they were funneling pretty well, but they just kept, you know,

it was it was funny. You'd see Jalen Brunson dribbling on the right wing and he'd be being guarded by Contavious callball Pope, and you'd literally hear Tom Thibodeau screaming from the sideline two two two, which I'm assuming was him asking for a two one ball screen, which means the pick point guard is your one right and you're

shooting guard is your two. And in this case, I want to say it was Emmanuel Quickly, but he was being guarded by Jamal Murray and he's just calling for a ball screen to try to get a switch, and then Jalen Brunson would get onto Jamal Murray and then just immediately go to work. I think he scored on him three times down the stretch of this game, including icing the game by getting him up in the air and with a pump fake and getting to the foul line.

Then on the other end of the floor, it was a steady diet of Murray Yoket's pick and roll, and it was It's kind of an interesting adjustment from New York because Yokis was killing them in the role. Just Jamal Murray dragging that second defender around, dropping off to Yoki's yoke. It's just doing that hard power dribble into his spin move back towards his right hand to make

that little floating hook shot that he makes. And they were having a lot of success there, but then Julius Randall just started completely ignoring Aaron Gordon and parking in the paint. So then Yokich's adjustment was to pop to the three point line and out there the first time, like Jamal Murray just didn't even look at Yokich and shot like a floater over a double team that he missed. Some of Jamal Murray's late game decision making hasn't been great.

And then on another one, they kicked it out too many, pump faked and he missed to three, So that a little adjustment from the Knicks got them the two big stops that they needed at the end of the game. And you're starting to see a lot of teams now really ignoring Aaron Gordon, really ignoring Christian Braun, really ignoring

Jeff Green in the week side corner. The Knicks were doing that the entire second half, and you know, guys like Christian Braun and Jeff Green, they're making shots, but teams aren't guarding them, and that fundamentally changes the way that it feels offensively with congestion in the paint. And then Tavia's called Pope, has just kind of gone cold and he missed several wide open looks in the second half of this game that would have changed the dynamic. And KCP is one of the most reliable guys in

the league. So some of that's just bad luck. But you know what, you can't you can't take bad luck to the standings. It's a loss at the end of the day, the Knicks have won three straight. Really nice response because they won nine straight. Then Jalen Brunson gets hurt and you lose three tough road games in the Western Conference. But then you just get it together. You get a big win over the Lakers the other night, and then you rip off a three game winning street,

culminating with that really impressive win against Denver. So that's you know, what's that twelve out of fifteen. It's of an impressive streak from the Knicks. Their identity really starts is really starting to make sense to me. They're an outstanding perimeter defense team. Like that. They went on a run early fourth quarter with Yokich on the bench, in large part once again because Josh Hart Emmanuel quickly RJ Barrett just containing the ball in really causing issues for

Denver's offense. They're lucky they got a three out of Jeff Green and Christian Braun on skip passes, because if those shots didn't go in, they would have been in big trouble in that bench run. But that's a big part of New York's identity defensively, outstanding perimeter defense. They are ninth overall in defensive rating over their last fifteen games, which is impressive for a team that doesn't have a great defensive front court. They're pushing in transition a lot

on misses and steals. They're not turning the ball over. They're not turning other teams over that much because they're more of a slide your feet, keep the ball in front type of team instead of a gamble and be aggressive type of team. But they are pushing and their tenth and fast breakpoints per game scored over their last fifteen games. And then in the half court, they're just

attacking matchups. It's just Julius Randall and Jalen Brunson picking on your weakest defender every time down the floor, which has worked well for them because both of those guys can get to pull up jump shots in the mid range, so some of the spacing can earns from off ball shooting in Mitchell Robinson don't really bother them as long as they can get to their spots and they're pull up jump shots. Julius Randall has run over five hundred ISOs this year, over a point per possession. He's isoing

seven times per game. Jalen Brunson two hundred and forty ISOs this year, four times per game, one point one eight points per possession on ISOs. For Jalen Brunson, that's third best in the league out of the twenty players to attempt at LEAs two hundreds, so he's one of the very best high volume ISO players in the league.

So they're defending, they're running when they can. Then when they get into the half court, it's a steady diet of matchup attacking with Jalen Brunson and Julius Randall, and then they're crashing the hell out of the offensive glass. Julius Randall, Isaiah Hartenstein, and Mitchell Robinson are all top twenty eight in the league in total offensive rebounds this year. Josh Hart there are two guards in the league this year that have at least one hundred offensive rebounds. It's

Josh Hart and Josh Kiddy, who's six foot eight. So they're just extremely relentless on the offensive glass as well. They have an identity, and again everything comes down to Julius Randall Jalen Brunson making enough plays offensively in the playoffs, but it's cool to see their identity forming and you could see Nicks basketball becoming a cultural thing that they can build on by supplementing with talent moving forward. Now

it's fun time to be a Knicks fan. The Nuggets have now lost five out of six, with their only win being against the Pistons. When I started recording this video, they were they were up double digits in Brooklyn and the tail end of a back to back, So they might be getting right today, we'll see. But their twenty ninth and defense over that span, and again we've talked a lot about Yokich, and again the Yokich thing is just a lot of conversational It's been heavy as a

conversational topic. But the reality is is that has to do with MVP and comparing him to MBID and Jannis. Like, one of the biggest defensive weak links for the Nuggets right now is Jamal Murray's. This has been something I've been talking about all season, but he's one of their one of their biggest entry points, and he was getting targeted non stop down the stretches this game, and he hasn't been playing well enough offensively to cover for it.

Although he did get going offensively against the Knicks and made a bunch of big plays until he missed that late floater. The Nuggets are also struggling to rebound. They're twenty fourth and defensive rebound percentage. They're losing thirty percent. Thirty percent of the time they force ay miss the other team is getting the offensive rebound. That's a problem right now. But here's the other thing. They usually cover for all that stuff with offense, and they're fifteenth and

offense over this span. Big part of that is KCP and Jamal Murray cooling off from three. That's a big part of their offensive punt punch. Yokich I think, you know, again, it's hard to be super critical because he's averaging twenty nine, but there's still I think that when the team is struggling to make shots that Yokis needs to try to be a little bit more aggressive. It kind of reminds me of early Lebron, and Lebron's much better at this now,

and I'm sure Yokich will be in his future. But there comes a time in a place where making the right play is no longer the option, and now it's yeah, I'm I know that guy's open, but I'm Nickel Yokich and these dudes can't guard me. And I need to score a little bit more. And that's the thing, Like I'd like to see Yoka s hit that higher gear in stretches like this, try to get up to thirty four thirty five points per game and try to carry

the offense until guys start making shots again. Then you can kind of settle back into the background and then something to keep an eye on again. As teams are ignoring that week side corner, they're conceding shots to guys like Aaron Gordon and Christian Brown and Jeff Green and again, like I said, sometimes they're making them, but it's not just about that. It's about the way teams are guarding you in the way that disrupts all of your other actions.

Hopefully they'll get back on tracking. It's Brooklyn today, but they have a tough schedule in the next two weeks. They play the Bucks, the Sixers, and the Suns. And you know, one last thing I'll say about the Nuggets because everyone a lot of people are saying, like, hey,

it's an urgency thing. They had a big League Like even after all of this, they're just three losses or they still have a three loss advantage over the Kings with like eleven games left or whatever, so they're still in pretty solid shape, right, But like I don't necessarily buy that as an excuse. Is particularly because of what Denver needs. Denver has personnel shortcomings when it comes to

rebounding in defense. That's just a fact. So they need to be extremely sharp on the details to get enough stops and to secure enough for rebounds to win in the playoffs. So details do matter for them. Habits do matter for them, and them not being sharp going into the postseason is a very bad omen for them. So I would be I'm going to be paying very close attention to Denver here down the stretch, just to see if they can get sharp in time to be ready

for that playoff run. All right, guys, it's all I have for tonight. We're taking another day off tomorrow. That the NBA schedule is a little weird here around the NC Double A tournament. They don't have a lot of nationally televised games. It's a lot of lesser matchups. But if things pick up again during the middle of the week, So these these next two weekends are a little weird. But we're taking tomorrow off. We're gonna be doing a

show on Tuesday morning. That covers Monday nights games, and then we're gonna be working Wednesday night, I believe, after the final buzzure of Suns Lakers. So uh see you guys on Tuesday. As always, I appreciate your support. The volume