Hoops Tonight - Thunder-Mavericks Reaction: Luka Doncic & Mavs SHOCK OKC, advance to WCF

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in Kansas twenty one plus age varies by jurisdiction. Void in Ontario. Bonus bets expire one hundred and sixty eight hours after issuance. See DKNG dot co slash bball for eligibility and deposit restrictions, terms and responsible gaming resources. All right, welcome to night. You're at the volume. Happy Saturday, everybody, Oh ball, If you guys are having a great start to your weekend. Well, the basketball gods looked on us kindly today and finally gave us an entertaining basketball game.

Now had kind of a brutal final sequence which we'll get into. But the Dallas Mavericks end up closing out the Oklahoma City Thunder in six games, are gonna advance to the next round to play the winner of that Minnesota Denver game tomorrow, which is gonna be an exciting one.

We're gonna get into all the details. I'm gonna talk a little bit about Shay's first playoff series as well, which I thought was a revelation, and then we're gonna talk a little bit about Oklahoma City looking forward as well. You guys know the joke before we get started. Subscribe to a brand new YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at

underscore JSNLT so you guys don't miss you announcements. Don't forget about a podcast feed wherever you get your podcast. Own our hoops tonight, and then keep dropping mail bag questions in those YouTube comments that we can keep hitting them throughout the remainder of the postseason. All right, let's talk some basketball. So I want to kind of start with that final sequence. You know a couple things the it was gonna be chaos kind of no matter what.

I'm gonna start with the final play first, and then we'll get into some of the other crunch time details, like Luca kind of had his head down and was just his way to the basket right, and so that kind of baited Shay into making that gamble, and when he did, you know you're gambling on a player in Luca, who obviously has struggled with turning the ball over a little bit in this series, but he's a guy that has pretty good floor awareness, probably knows what's going on,

and he kind of regained control of the basketball just in time to shovel it out there to PJ Washington, and then from there, Shay has no choice but to go with just a chaotic like hard close out right, and so PJ pump bakes and Shae goes for it and from there, like, if you're Shay, you just have to You've broken his rhythm already. You broke his rhythm. Now he's just jacking the shota right, so it's not even worth swiping back the way that he did, So

like there was a risk involved there. I didn't like to call yes by the absolute letter of the law. By the book, he did come through and hit him on the forearm after hitting the basketball, but generally speaking, like when you start a block by hitting the basketball first, I'm more or less of the opinion that everything else

is fair game from there. Obviously, I know Mavicks fans will disagree, but at the end of the day, like I didn't really have a I didn't have a problem with the call standing after review, but I'd prefer that that doesn't get called. But even under that circumstance, Tyree hit a little swim move from the elbow and he had the inside angle on that offensive rebound put back, and I think he was just gonna get the game winner, or at least what would have amounted as to the

game winner after that. And like, even if you don't use the challenge there and you have your time out, Tyrie's put back would have taken considerably more time off the clock, and so it would have been Thunderball down by one, but like maybe even less than a second left, right, I didn't see exactly how much time would have been left, So like it was ugly. You hate to see a series end like that, But I feel like, even if

the whistle doesn't blow there, Dallas wins the series. And if again, if you're Oklahoma City, if you're Shay, and Shae was Shaye was unfreaking believable in this game, And we're gonna talk at length later about how impressed I was by him in his first ever playoff run. Is the number one option on his team. But you broke his rhythm, make him take that tough like kind of break rhythm, pump fake three point shot in the corner,

and live with the results. As soon as you start swinging back around trying to block the shot, that's when you open the door up for the whistle, which is what's gonna give him three chances to make two free throws to win that game. And so like ugly don't like the whistle, feel like Dallas wins even if they don't blow the whistle. So it felt to me like

the right team won. And even if you look at Oklahoma City potentially stealing that game, they lost their last two home games against Dallas and didn't look particularly great in either of them. So feels to me like the right team won the series, even though that was a very very unfortunate kind of sequence to end the game.

That said, down the stretch, it kind of felt like right around the mid third quarter on, it kind of felt like this relentless wave from from Dallas, like Kyrie got it going in that third quarter, Luka Doncic got it going. Kyrie went on another run in that fourth quarter stretch, then Luca got it going down the stretch of the game. There was just unbelievable shot making all

over the floor. Kyrie hit this like bailout three at the end of the shot clock where he took this, I need to go back and look because the footwork on it was so fascinating to me. He was like squared up with the defender and he like just threw the ball out to the left and covered like twelve feet with some wild hop step and then rose up and knocked down the three. I need to look at the footwork there because that was super fascinating as like a move to go to when you need like emergency

separation at the tail end of a shot clock. I'm really curious to see what that one looked like a little bit closer, But like Kyrie and Luca were just amazing, and it kind of felt like Shay was just stiff arming them the entire stretch, right Like they go on that stretch in the middle of the third quarter, and I think I think Dallas got it to two if I remember correctly, and Shae hits like that one leg bank shot off the glass, he hits the short fade

away off the right baseline, he hits the step back three that seven points just kind of like stiff armed that advance from Dallas, and then down the stretch of

this game, Dallas like had zero answers for Shae. Remember we got earlier in the series that that Luca I think in the postgame presser was like asking for the for Dallas to start double teaming Shae because they were having trouble guarding him, and they randomly double teamed him on a late possession in the game and Jalen Williams got wide open for three and knocked it down even on the the lob the Chet that gave Oklahoma City the lead late, Like Shae kind of turned the corner

in Chet's man stepped up in help and Chet was just wide open on the baseline. It was they were just compromised no matter what they did with Shae. They tried running zone that didn't have a ton of success either, and so it just was they just were really struggling with Shae. And then on the other end of the floor, Oklahoma City was struggling with Luca and and it just turned into a shot making contest and Dallas just made more shots. I thought Derek Lively was unbelievable on the

offensive glass in the fourth quarter. We saw the tip tunk, but he was drawing fouls, getting offensive rebounds, was really doing some damage to Chet underneath the rim just by being physical and beating him to fifty to fifty balls. And we're going to get into more detail with this with Oklahoma City, but you know what was the biggest problem with Oklahoma City all season the ability to control

the defensive glass. I think they were twenty seventh or twenty eighth in opponent offensive or in defensive rebound percentage and fourteen to seven in offensive rebounds tonight twenty seven to eight in second chance points in favor of Dallas. That's the game. That's the game right there. So like the issue that plagued you all season long ended up being what costs you at the end of the day, which is what we'll get into when we talk a little bit more about Oklahoma City down the line. But

shout out to Derek Lively. I thought his activity was incredible and then big plays down the stretch. PJ. Washington got in foul trum. Those of you guys who've ever played the organized basketball know that, like when you get in foul trouble, it's really frustrating because like you're playing in these short spurts. Even when you get back into the game, it feels weird to be out there because like you're out of rhythm and everyone else has got like a good sweat and is ready to go, and

you've been sitting for a long time. Like foul trouble can really be problematic for rhythm. And he was struggling to make shots, but he had a couple of big ones down the stretch of this game, including the foul shots late. Obviously they were struggling with Shaye, but he also got some big stops on Shay down the stretch of this game. He struggled. You know, I was looking

at the matchups and I thought PJ. Washington would be able to hold that better against Shae, And honestly, the off the dribble stuff caused more problems like dribble penetration. Shae was able to beat him a little bit easier, but on the possessions where PJ was actually able to keep him in front, his length was a factor and he was able to kind of absorb that off arm and get really good contests and force him into some misses.

Darre Jones junior that ridiculous fade away he hit. But even then it was like, like that was classic Shae, Like Derek Jones hits this tough fade away over chet Holmgren goes sliding into the scorers table. Crowd's going crazy, and Shae just dribbles up the floor, just hits a hard in out dribble step back on on PJ. Washington and gets just barely enough separation and knocks it down and you're like, holy shit, here we are again. One fifteen, one thirteen. Like, I can't say enough about Shaye. I

thought he was unbelievable. But Dallas whether the storm again. Close out games are hard, Like this was kind of a weird game of like ebbing and flowing energy. Right like Oklahoma City comes out the gates red hot, they get up by ten. Dallas scrounges, you know, just kind of works really hard, gets back into the game and they tied it. I think it was like forty two forty two in the middle second quarter. And then okay See goes on this crazy run to end the second quarter.

They force Dallas into a bunch of turnovers. They're running out in transition, they're getting dunks and wide open corner threes. All of a sudden they're up by what were they up at the halftime, like fourteen fifteen points, right, and like then you go on this crazy run and you fight back, and then Shay goes on his little seven zer run that goes on right, and then in the fourth quarter of you're battling and here comes Shay again, and here comes Jalen Williams. Like it was just that

close out games are hard. You can't replicate the urgency that comes from actually facing elimination, and so I thought it was an impressive job from Dallas to just kind

of weather that storm and get through it. And again, like we said at the top, like hate to see a series end like that, but I every way I look at that possession with the one hinged piece being the whistle, even if that doesn't get blown, I still think Dallas wins that game in all likelihood, So like it's ugly, but it felt like the right team won. Moving on to Dallas in the next round, I'll be

picking Minnesota or Denver, regardless who comes out. I think both of those teams are playing at a little bit

of a higher level right now. But I think Dallas has a chance against those two teams in a way that Oklahoma City didn't in terms of Oklahoma City's lack of size, like as we talked about, like Dallas isn't particularly big, but they were able to out big Oklahoma City in a lot of different ways, like even just chet struggling with Derek Lively down the stretch of this game, right twenty seven to eight and second chance points like

that's really difficult to weather under any circumstances. And we all know what Aaron Gordon and nikolea Jokic can do on the front line. We all know what that super athletic Minnesota Timberwolves team can do on the front line. So like, I don't think Oklahoma City would have had any chance in the conference finals, whereas I think Dallas does have a chance. And again with Dallas, it's gonna be all about you know, both specifically Denver, and I

do believe Denver will win tomorrow, though we'll see. I think Minnesota has a good chance if Denver were to advance. Denver is very much a load up type of defense. They like to bring Jokich up to the level of the screen. They like to tag the roller usually the weak side is where the openings are, and Luka Dancic is just one of the very best players in the league at getting the ball across the floor to the

weak side corner. As a matter of fact, I actually think that Denver is gonna have to think long and hard about using more of a load drop coverage to try to stay out of rotation as much as possible and try to count on on Cacp and Aaron Gordon to just get enough stops. But it's gonna be really really interesting matchups in the next round. A big part

of winning tonight is you get yourself three days. I think I heard Luca in the postgame interview say that he's gonna that the team's gonna probably take tomorrow off before they start practicing. That's gonna be big, just in terms of getting Luca's knee a chance to have some

additional rest going into the next round. Like this is a you know, to quote Lebron James because he says this every year, but like every round gets harder no matter what you think, no matter how hard you think the matchups are, every round just ends up getting harder. And like even for Denver, if they survive Minnesota, Like, they're not gonna be able to think like, oh, we're

going into an easier matchup against Dallas. No, Like, Dallas just is just a different basketball team and they have a lot more offensive firepower than Minnesota had, and they're gonna present a whole other different set of challenges. And like even for Minnesota, Like Minnesota, if they beat Denver tomorrow, like you're gonna sit there and think like, oh, it's gonna No, it's not gonna get any easier. Dallas is going to present their own set of issues for Minnesota.

It's going to be a challenge under any circumstances. We will have a full series preview on Monday morning after So, like the schedule as of right now, Tomorrow is Nick's Pacers. It's a three thirty Eastern start. I'll be going live on YouTube after that game. Then the night game is Denver Minnesota. I'm gonna be going with Colin that night, I'm pretty sure. But even if I go with Colin, I plan on doing an instant reaction after that game on my feed, and then Monday morning will have a

series preview. So Mavericks fans keep an eye on the feeds for Monday morning. Moving on to Oklahoma City, I want to talk a little bit about Shay's first playoff series first, just kind of focus in on him and then look at Oklahoma City as like a whole, you know. I was really curious to see what Shay's first playoff

run would look like. As the number one guy, he kind of falls into a category of players similar to James Harden, Trey Young, Luka Doncic, that are very heliocentric in the sense that so many possessions involve Shay picking on a matchup, dribbling, you know, fifteen to twenty times

on a possession before he gets to his spot. And I've always had this kind of theory that when heliocentric players they face the same perimeter defenders over and over and over and over again, that they have the propensity

to get solved sometimes. And I thought we saw that in a big way with James Harden, and I think we've seen that quite a bit with Trey Young over the years, but specifically with Luca was the first guy that kind of dawned on me where it's like he's got some resiliency because he's just willing to attack from anywhere, Like, yeah, he might control all these possessions, but like, if he needs to go to the mid range, he can go to the mid range. If he needs to go to

the post, he can go to the post. If he needs to work from beyond the three point line, he can work from beyond the three point line. If he needs to function more as a playmaker against a loaded up defense, he can function more as a playmaker against

the loaded up defense. Whereas with James Harden, it was like all live dribble, all ice own pick and roll, all from the wings, all step back the reason layups, and then he kind of sort it added a floater towards the tail end of the of the Houston run right, So like that was in a lot of ways what I thought led to James Harden having some struggles, specifically

with Shae. What I was really curious about is he's not a guy we really think about is over like a absolute top tier athlete, and he doesn't have the size that Luca has, Like Luca has like a really really big frame, and so like, as long as he can control angles and leverage, like he's just so damn big that he it's kind of like that final possession, like lou Dort couldn't stop Luca from getting two feet, you know, damn near right underneath the basket before Shay

came in and helped, because lucas just big as hell and there's not a whole lot you can do about that, right, So I was really curious to see a slender, not top tier athlete type of player like Shay to see how he look in his first playoff series, and he just passed with absolute flying colors. No one can guard the guy. His hesitation start stop movements keep everybody off balance.

I talked about this at the end of the The Last Night Show in the mail bag, But he has this move where like he'll go between the legs kind of slow, but then as he goes between the legs kind of slow, like he'll be down in this lungey looking stance where he's like got all of his kinetic

energy just kind of like saved up right. And then when the ball gets to that other hand, whether it's right to left or left to right, just like somewhere right like a split second after he gets it in his left hand, he'll just take off and he gets like a lot of separation with that that first step and gets and he can beat He gets beat people

off the dribble extremely easily. Like there was a play in the first half where he was I think he was being guarded by Derek Jones Junior, but he got screened and Derek Lively was in the drop and he just went right around Derek Lively so easily got into the paint and I think he ended up missing a

reverse layup on this play. But I remember sitting there thinking like, like he's so like he has not had any trouble getting to his spot over the course of this series, and like one of the unique things about Shaye too, And you know, they what was the phrase that I think I Richard Jefferson saying that the thunder. You know, staff and players they referred to him as like mister consistency or mister consistent or something like that. And a big part of that is he's willing to

work close to the basket when you're taking shots. Again, like I talk about three level scoring, Shay's not taking a ton of like twenty footers, right, Like it's a lot of like he'll take the threes, like he'll take twenty four footers, but like, for the most part, his jump shooting is like fifteen feet in in and so when you're taking the majority of your jumpers fifteen feet in in, those are just higher percentage shots. It's like

four level scoring, right. It's like there's there's threes, there's the rim, there's long twos, and then there's short twos. And so because Shay's able to get to his spots against basically anybody, and because he can hit you know, close to fifty percent of those shots, there's a resiliency with Shaye that I found really impressive. Like, I think his worst game in this series, if I remember correctly,

I think he went ten for twenty. Like, that's not that bad of a game, right, Like, there is a resiliency with Shae that shined through in a big way. And you can point a lot of different different directions for where things went wrong for Oklahoma City in this series. None of them were Shay. He was right there with Luca and Kyrie the entire series and outplayed them in many cases. Shae was incredible. Can't say enough about how impressed I was by him in his first playoff runs.

He has just continued his ascent on schedule from what we saw a couple of years ago when he first started flashing that superstar potential. Talking about Oklahoma City looking forward, a couple of things. Don't worry too much about the downsides of what you saw from Oklahoma City this year. Some of the execution errors, some of the drive and

kick decision making that was so poor. Some of the rough nights that like Jalen Williams had where he's struggling to kind of read the floor and see what was happening around him. So much of that was young players. Now, I understand that the theme of this playoff run has been young players doing well, but the truth of the matter is, it's not the early twenty guys that have been doing well, except for Anthony Edwards. It's mostly been the late twenties guys that have been controlling the show

here in this postseason run. Like these Thunder players are excruciatingly young compared to a lot of these other teams out there, and when we've seen other young teams make runs like the Thunder in twenty twelve, there were a lot of veteran presences on the roster, Guys like Kendrick Perkins, Guys like Derek Fisher. They had an element of experience in their rotation that was substantial in something that I

think made that team different. So like, you're gonna just get several orders of magnitude better next year, just by getting another year another offseason of workouts for all these guys and like Chet unbelievable defensive playoff run. But hey man, the three point shots not as consistent as it needs to be. So he's got to get in the gym this summer and turn himself from a shooter into a maker.

He's got to be a guy that you can't just live with the lake close out on, but a guy that you absolutely have to be there on the catch or he's gonna burn you. That's an opportunity for him to get some more Jalen Williams. I think he learned a little bit about the difference in intensity in these environments and how getting separation for these shots and making reads when you drive into traffic are a little bit tougher.

Another offseason for him in another eighty two games of reps will go a long way towards helping right now, as far as the personnel gap goes, we talked about it all season long, no matter how many games the thunder one, no matter how many times they beat a really good team at the top of the league. I consistently said, you can't win in the NBA playoffs if

you're that bad at defensive rebounding. And they just do not have a big forward that they can play alongside Chet so that they have a physical profile that allows them to contend on the defensive glass. And that's just something that they're gonna have to address this offseason. I think that they're like the perfect candidate for a team that I think should be throwing everything on the table

for a guy like Lori Markinen. I think if they can get a big four and specifically a guy who specializes playing off the ball, your on ball creators are great. Shay is perfect, Jalen Williams is perfect. That everything is great about that. The guy that you need to find somebody who is a professional off ball player, but one that can help you on the defensive glass and can help you in low man possessions. I think Lori Markahen

would be perfect. He's like the absolute like shoe In like cannot conceive of a better basketball fit for that power forward spot next to Chet. He's big, he's strong, he's very good athlete. He would be in a role that accentuates what he's great at. I think that that's the kind of direction they need to look to go. But everything else is like everything else is the sky's the limit for this Oklahoma City team. You love the depth.

Lou Dort played Luca into two of the worst playoff games I've ever seen him play in Game one in Game four, that's the credit to lou Dort. I saw lou Dort make Luca lose his composure in a way I've never seen him lose his composure before. You've got one of the best big perimeter defenders in the league. Now he's got to work on not fouling as much. He's got to kind of find a happy medium in there, but he's going to You've got everything looks everything looks great.

You just have to upgrade that Josh Getty position into a bonafide, legitimate two way power forward that can kind of anchor things for you on the front line. Great season though for Oklahoma City. Really think they're gonna be a perennial powerhouse in this league. Just too young and a little too small and a couple of critical weaknesses that did them in this season. All right, guys, that

is all I have for tonight. As always, as sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting me and supporting the show. We're going to be back tomorrow right after the final buzzer of Nick Pacers with a breakdown of with an instant reaction to that game, and then again in the evening with Colin and most likely my channel as well to break down timber Wolves Nuggets. And then all you Maverick's fans don't forget, We'll have a series pre you on Monday morning. I appreciate you, guys. I will see

you tomorrow. The volume