Hoops Tonight - Warriors-Timberwolves Series Preview + Prediction

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New customers only bonus bets expire one hundred and sixty eight hours after issuance. For additional terms and responsible gaming resources, see dkang dot co slash audio. All right, we'll doing Hoops tonight. You're at the volume heavy Monday, everybody hope alth You guys are having a great start to your week. We are giving our series preview for the Minnesota Timberwolves versus Golden State Warriors today. Agonizing, I walked into this zoom call still not knowing who I was going to pick,

but then I ended up following my gut. You guys will see at the tail end of the show. You guys are the drill before we get started. Subscribed to the Hoops and I YouTube channels. You don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore jcnltcs. You guysn't miss you announcements. Don't forget about a podcast feed where we get your podcast owner who tonight. It's also super helpful if you leave your rating and review

on that front. Jackson's doing great work on our social media feeds Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, make sure you follow hoops tonight, there and the last, but not at least keep dropping those mail bag questions in the YouTube comments. All right, let's talk some basketball. So the season series, the Warriors went three to one. They lost their first matchup of

the year, but they won three straight. All of the games were before the trade deadline, so a lot of different players involved, specifically for the Warriors, a lot of Andrew Wiggins, a lot of Dennis Schroeder, guys that obviously

aren't on the team anymore. I did think there were plenty of examples though, of just the sheer difference between this matchup and the Lakers matchup, specifically for Minnesota's defense, which will go over and We've talked about it a few times already, but I want to get into some more detail today, and particularly in crunch time, the Wolves

really struggled to guard Golden State. In the three Warriors wins, there were ten clutch minutes, meaning ten minutes of game time where the game was within at least five points and with than five minutes left. In those ten minutes, the Warriors logged a one thirty two offensive rating as they repeatedly struggled to deal with steph in space. The overall metrics for the matchup, both teams logged a one

hundred and thirteen offensive rating. Overall, both teams grabbed over thirty one percent of their own misses, so both teams struggled to keep each other off of the offensive glass. The odds right now, Minnesota is a minus one seventy five favorite. That feels about right to me. In terms of Vegas odds, I think this is going to be

a very close series. In a vacuum, I would view this series as essentially a coin flip, But under the real world circumstances, I feel like Minnesota should absolutely be the slightly favor the slight favorite that they are. If you start to go down the list, it's like, Okay, they looked more impressive in the first round, right, Like they beat a better team quicker, right, Although for me personally, I don't think that has much bearing on this series.

I'm a big believer that each matchup in the playoffs is its own unique brand of basketball and and it just doesn't matter, right, Like, for instance, Minnesota beating Denver last year, I thought Denver was the best team in the Western Conference. They caught an extremely unfavorable matchup against Minnesota. Minnesota beat them. I think Denver was better than that Dallas team. Minnesota runs into Dallas, totally different matchup. Minnesota

really struggles and gets ousted in five games. Like just because Minnesota looked more impressive against a better team in the first round, that means nothing. As you throw the ball up in the air at center court tomorrow night against the Golden State Warriors. It is a fundamentally different basketball team that plays a fundamentally different style. It is not it is not remotely the same situation. But for Vegas' sake, Minnesota did look more impressive. They have home court as well,

and they have a substantial rest advantage. They've been done since Wednesday prepping for this series and getting rest, although I don't think it matters as much for as young and athletic team as they are. But on the other side, Golden State just finished a blood bath with Houston. Yeah literally just finished last night, And as def said, they'd literally packed their bags from Minnesota and they went straight to Minnesota from Houston. So obviously a bunch of like

those kinds of factors that favor Minnesota. I think that's enough to at least make Minnesota a slight gambling favorite the way that they are. So let's talk about Minnesota on the offensive end of the floor. The first big question is how will the Warriors look to counter Minnesota's interior size, like, will they size up to try to compete physically, or will they size down to try to

space Minnesota out and win with their speed. My guess is that Kurr is going to start by splitting the difference,

meaning he'll start Quinton Post. You're bigger that way, but Posts can also drag at least one of Minnesota's bigs out of the paint, although I would not be surprised if in this series we see Minnesota and Chris Finch try a similar strategy to what Houston tried and try to put Rudy Gobert not on Julius Rant or excuse me, not on Draymond Green, not on like a you know, a more of a screening a screen en roll threat

like a Gary Payton. But keep an eye on whether or not they try to go bear on like Moses Moody whenever he's on the floor, try to put him in a situation where he can help. There's also the issue with if you put Gobert, if you put Draymond on Gobert, there's there's the simple problem that you're gonna have another size mismatch elsewhere in the front court, right, But like I think they'll start with Quinton Post. That's

my guess. The other direction I could see Steve Kerr going is to ride the hot streak up Buddy Heeld is on. In the last three wins in the Rockets series, Buddy Heeld averaged twenty two points per game on fifty six percent from the field and fifty five percent from three. He was massive on offense in all three games. Obviously, that would put the Warriors in a physical bind in terms of size and strength, But that comes with all sorts of advantages on the offensive end of the floor,

which we'll talk about. Step one on this side of the floor when Minnesota's on offense is the physicality matchup. Will the Wolves be able to do to Golden State what the Rockets did to Golden State or what the Wolves did to Golden State in the regular season, which is dominate them on the offensive glass. There's no real schematic thing to get to here. For Minnesota, it's about being relentless with their effort and wearing Golden State down

over the course of the series. For Golden State, it's about Sandwich rebounding, getting a body on the Bigs, coming over the top and grabbing those rebounds while the Bigs are in physical altercations on the ground. That's just we're gonna see which direction that swings over the course of the series. My guess as well, see phases for both teams where they do extensive damage on the offensive glass in action. So in the half court, how are they

going to guard the Wolves? In the first round, the Wolves ran a steady diet of ISO and post ups because the Lakers did a ton of switching. So it turned into Aunt and Julius picking on whatever matchup they wanted and looking to attack, and Ant made a lot of really high quality reads throughout that series. In the four wins, Aunt averaged eight assists per game in just

one turnover. He did have zero assists in their one loss, though, something to keep in mind, like if you can play him into a game where he doesn't pass the ball as well. But this series will likely involve some more variety in the coverages than what they saw from La We're probably gonna see more zone from Golden State in the series than the Lakers tried. Draymond will likely be on Rudy Gobert every time he's on the floor, and

that's not gonna be a switching look. Like I think they'll switch with Draymond if the on ball guy gets like completely wiped out by a screen, but I think he's gonna be in more of a high drop coverage. I think Draymond's gonna be up at the level trying to disrupt at knowing that they're gonna be sharp on the back line with Uh, with Rudy on his rolls or whoever it is that Draymond's guarding in those situations.

But what that means is that Anthony Edwards's job is going to be very different as an initiator in this series. His ball screen attack is going to be very different. The Lakers did not try any hedge and recover type of scheme to protect Luca, meaning like if they screen with Luca's man, Luca would just switch on to Ant

and they would go. What you will see is if Ant tries to attack Steph Curry in a ball screen, Steph's gonna throw a hedge, and then he's gonna get back to you know, Dante E Vincenzo, Mike Conley, Na Kail, Alexander Walker, whichever one of those guards that he's guarding. They're not gonna let Ant just pick on Steph if

they can avoid it. Obviously, guys get wiped out by screens, and Steph will have to guard Aunt occasionally, whether it's a transition cross match, on offensive rebound cross match, or just a really good screen that he is forced to set. But for the most part, they're not gonna switch with Draymond. They're not gonna switch with Steph, which means all of a sudden, Anthony Edwards's passing reads are not just simple

drive in kick reads. There drop coverage reads. They're being making the read against that little slip screen to Dante Devincenzo or Mike Conley every time that Steph is throwing a hedge. It's just a very different mental job for Ant in this series. And one of the things we saw is like if you can with that Dallas Maverick series, and even at times in the Denver series last year when Denver was you know, because again Denver controlled that series for a good half of it. Before you know,

Minnesota pulled away in that series. High drop activity on Ant at the level was what actually played him into his worst tendencies. And so it's just gonna be a very different job. And that's the biggest thing I'll be watching in game one, just how uncomfortable Steve Kerr can

make Anthony Edwards with his defensive game plan. Draymond's a master manipulator on defense, making you think he's doing one thing and then doing another, baiting you, like if if Ant changes his tactic and decides to start attacking Jimmy Butler in ball screens and just in gener attacking Quinton Post in ball screens and anywhere where Draymond's off the ball, Draymond will be in the paint, making Ant think he's in the paint, while always being completely attentive to whatever

would happen on the skip pass or swing pass that could make Draymond close out to the perimeter. I will be watching carefully to see just how comfortable Ant looks offensively in Game one. Steve Curry is going to mix in that one to three one zone. He's going to mix in blitzes. I think he'll do a better job of keeping Ant off balance than JJ Reddick, and that

limited Lakers defensive roster was able to do. The last thing I want to hit here is just more the on ball like ball pressure piece for Golden State with Ant, like this is more a question about Golden State's offense because we know it's going to be Moses Moody or Brandon Pajemski or Gary Payton, and it's gonna be about which one of those guys can provide the best combination of that ball pressure and containment while also being useful on the other end of the floor, because again, like

we saw in the Houston series, if they end up having to lean towards Buddy Heeled a lot because the other guys are not doing anything offensively, that changes some

of the athletic dynamic for this team. Right Like Moody, I would be tracking Moody's shooting substantially early in the series because if Moody can't shoot and he can't play, that's where it gets tricky, because he's the one guy who really has the combination of the length to bother Ant's pull up jumper while also having enough mobility to be a little bit of a deterrent on the ball, so keep an eye on specifically Moses Moody's shooting early in the series. Now, a Minnisota is a lot more

versatile than people think. They can attack size mismatches. With Julius Randall and Nas reed. They have guards that can get going and scoring as scorers. Dante di Vincenzo can get going in action. But Golden State did defend their big forwards well in the regular season. Both Julius and Nas were well below their season averages and well below

their season efficiency against Golden State. Jada McDaniels didn't have He shot the ball well from three, but didn't put up any real high volume scoring against Golden State this season, but he came on way more as a score in the later portion of the season after all those Golden State games, So obviously Jada McDaniels doing more damage as a score would be an interesting thing that could swing

this series. Golden State is generally good at keeping the ball in front, which makes this substantially tougher than what the Lakers matchup looked like. They were able to get dribble penetration pretty consistently whenever they wanted. Golden State is quick, they can slide their feet, and they're gonna beat guys

to spots. And so I would argue the most important trend, the most important thing that Minnesota has to do to flip the regular season trend, which is where Golden State won those last three games, is they got to get their big guys going, They got to get nasried, and they got to get Julius Randall going because they did not provide the complimentary scoring to what Anthony Edwards was doing.

In general, Minnesota shot the ball really well or really poorly, excuse me, from two point range in this regular season matchup. Even ant Ant did most of his damage behind the three point line. And so that's that's a testament to Golden State's defense and the job that they do sliding their feet and winning the battle on the ground. But if in order for Minnesota to win this series, they're gonna have to get for their front court players going

in some way on offense. I just think Golden State's defense is really good and I think they're well equipped to handle this particular Minnesota team. I think it's going to be a challenge for Minnesota to score. And like again, guys, I understand that that the Timberwolves had a very dominant performance against the Lakers. I'm not trying to undercut that specifically, but if you get into the details, the Lakers did slow them down. They did not score super effectively in

that first round series. I'm pulling up the numbers right now on cleaning the glass because I would just want to give you guys some perspective. But this is a team that I do believe the Warriors will be able to slow down. So just for a basic example, in the first round series against the Lakers, the Minnesota Timberwolves logged a ninety two point one offensive rating in the

half court against that Laker defense. The Houston Rockets averaged ninety two point four points per one hundred possessions in the half court against Golden State in the first round. So literally, Minnesota scored less effectively in the half court against Golden State than Houston did against Golden State. Or excuse me, I just butchered debt. Minnesota averaged more fewer points per one hundred possessions and half court against the

Lakers than Houston did against Golden State. And so what that means to me is that Minnesota is going up a level and the level of defense that they're going against, and Minnesota's offense can be slowed down when they're stuck in the half court and they have to process and it comes down to Anthony Everwards making decisions. And so I do think Golden State will have extensive success slowing

down Minnesota's offense over the course of this series. So let's move over to the other side of the ball. Jada McDaniels is going to get the primary matchup on Steph. He does a good job of making up for like he's a little bit upright, like we talked about last night on playback, Like he's a guy that you know, you can get shifted side to side, and Steph can

get around every once in a while. The main thing is Jaden does a good job of just using his hands to just kind of keep Steph attached to him. He does a good job. The biggest problem for Minnesota isn't their ability to defend Steph straight up with McDaniels. It's handling him in any sort of screening action. If you put Gobert on Draymond, Steph's gonna just run high ball screens with Draymond, and he's gonna get the ball

to Draymond in the pocket behind Gobert. Now, all of a sudden, you're playing four on three with Gobert trapped on the perimeter guarding right like, I think the Wolves are gonna have to strongly consider putting Rudy Gobert on a guy like Moses Moody, even a guy like Gary Payton, although Gary Payton, as we've seen, can have a lot of success as a role man. But they're gonna have to try to keep Gobert close to the rim whenever possible.

If they put Gobert on Draymond, I think that they're gonna just spam a bunch of high ball screens and have some success there where I worry about Minnesota, specifically Nas Reed and Julius Randall. Those two guys did extremely well defensively in the first round in what was a very different matchup. The Lakers were just trying to attack by going one on one, and so it was a lot of like Julius and Nas on an island guarding Lebron and Luca and doing a very good job sliding

their feet using their big strength. They're big frames to absorb contact in bump Lebron and Luca off of their base and force them into tough shots either at the rim or over the top. That is not what this offensive matchup is gonna look like. This is gonna be a lot of Steph Curry attacking them in space. We went over film examples in our last two playback sessions, but like Steph pretty consistently destroyed Julius Randall in space in the regular season when these teams matched up, he

got around Naz Reed whenever he wanted to. He was able to move around off ball on those guys and have success. Nas Julius and even Anthony Edwards to a little bit, to a certain extent, really struggled to handle Steph in those like kind of run around situations. And that really is where this is fundamentally different than the Lakers matchup. This is not a one on one matchup attacking series. This is a ball in player movement series.

But even if it degenerates down to one on one ball in a late game situation, I think Steph is gonna feel comfortable attacking Julius Randall in a way that's different than Luca and Lebron because it's a fundamentally different matchup. One of the things too, is the Wolves they won that series by staying out of rotation in against the Lakers in the situations where the Lakers were able to get two on the ball. So for instance, in the there were like there were like fifteen sixteen possessions in

that series where they blitzed Luca. When they blitzed Luca, the Lakers averaged a one point eighteen offensive rating, which is really good. When you get the Wolves into rotation, you can score on them because they're bigger and they you know, they can be a little bit susceptible to quickness on the ground. Right. The problem is that the Lakers just couldn't get that situation often enough to really

capitalize on it. I think Steph is going to be able to consistently either generate one on one advantages against Nas and Julius in this matchup, or get two to the ball and be able to get the Wolves in rotation. And so I think this is just going to be a very very different type of matchup in terms of what Minnesota is dev is going to do. I'm not worried about them being able to handle Jimmy. I think they match up really well with Jimmy. I think they

match up really well with the other Warriors guards. But that Steph Curry problem is the one that I'm worried about. And this is the last stat that I'll give you, guys, to drive this home. In the three wins that the Warriors had against the Wolves in the regular season, Steph Curry averaged thirty one points per game. He shot forty nine percent from three, he averaged nine assists per game, and just one point seven turnovers. And Guys, this was

all before the deadline. This was back when Steph wasn't playing particularly well. Steph didn't really start regularly hitting these numbers until after news of the Jimmy Butler trade came down to him. Like, Steph in a phase of the season when he wasn't particularly comfortable, was super comfortable in this matchup. And that's just something to keep him keep in mind. No one cares how impressive you looked in the last round. It ultimately comes down to your ability

to succeed in this individual matchup. Now, one of the things that I think will be interesting is Minnesota has a lineup that they've had a ton of success with this season that they started using more towards the end of the year and a lot in the Lakers series, which is, what if they just take go Bear off the floor and it turns into nas Red at the five next to Julius Randall with Dante DiVincenzo on the floor, more spacing, more ability for them to create opportunity for

Anthony Edwards and Julius Randall to work one on one. That's great, but once again, it doesn't work if Steph can easily attack nas Reid in space and generate easy offense. The Wolves went to nas Red in crunch time in this season series and couldn't guard Steph. And so that's where I keep coming down to, like, I was really on the fence about this series because on the one hand, I have this big part of me that's like, don't

underestimate the Timberwolves again. Don't make that mistake you did last year against Denver, you did last year against Phoenix, you did this year against the Lakers. And I get that, and I have this like part of me that's like screaming, like, don't make that mistake again. But I keep thinking about the simple dynamic, which is that this is a very very very good defense in Golden State that should be able to play Minnesota into some rough stretches on the

offensive end of the four. And I think Steph is going to be the most comfortable star in the series. It's not even about versus Steph in a vacuum. It's just the simple fact that Steph is kind of an antidote for this particular type of defense because of his relentless motion and his ability to win on the ground with quickness. And so this is how I see the

series going. This is my prediction. I think that Game one tomorrow night is a game that actually could bode really well for Golden State as an opportunity to steal home court advantage. The reason why Wolves haven't played since Wednesday, and they just played a really really different series. They won comfortably, They're riding high. There's a lot of optimism there. Golden State's coming in out of a blood bath, which I actually look at as an advantage in a game one.

Golden State just played three straight super high stakes games. Well I call it two straight because they kind of punted Game five, but they wanted Game six and they didn't get it. They needed Game seven and they did. They've been playing super high leverage basketball for the last few days, Minnesota has not. I think that gives them an advantage, and their style is just so different and so unique. I think it has a chance to catch Minnesota off guard. So I think Golden State's gonna steal

game one. I think Minnesota get Game two. I think Golden State will get games three and four back in Golden State. I think Minnesota gets Game five. And then the thing that put it over the edge for me is you have a must win Game six at home for Golden State and Golden State, the older, more physically frail team gets three full days off between Game five and Game six, where they would come out fresh on their home floor with an opportunity to close out the series.

So for me, I'm going Warriors in six based on the dynamic that I believe this Warrior's d defense is capable of really strangling this Minnesota offense, and I think Steph Curry is a nightmare matchup for Minnesota's defense. I was on the fence about this. I kept going back

and forth. I totally understand why Minnesota's favored. Maybe I'll watch Game one and totally feel differently, but I just have this feeling in my gut that Golden State's gonna win this series, and it just stems from the matchup and just how gifted Steph is at attacking this particular type of defense. So we'll see. Maybe I'll be wrong. I was wrong on three of my eight first round series picks.

Golden State. That they have just even more better guard defenders that they can throw at Steph, and they have rim protection and they have more offensive talent than Houston. Like, I have a really hard time talking myself into Golden State having any chance to beat Oklahoma City. But I do think that they can beat Minnesota. I think this is a matchup that they can win, and it's just based on what I've seen on tape in the dynamics

that I explained in this video. So again, we'll be covering all the games live on YouTube after Larwriors and six. Don't feel particularly great about it, but that's where I'm going right now with my gut. Tonight we are live after the final buzzer of Nuggets Thunder. I will see you guys then. What so, guys, As always, I appreciate you for listening to and supporting OOPS tonight. They would actually be really helpful for us if you guys would take a second and leave a rating and a review.

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