Hoops Tonight -Steph Curry & Warriors stumble vs. Pacers, why Kawhi & Clippers should be encouraged

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in West Virginia. All right, welcome to Hoops Tonight, presented by Vanduel here at the volume. Happy Tuesday, everybody. Hope all of you guys are having a good start to your week. Nice and quick show. Today, we're just gonna hit on two games. The Pacers going into Golden State down a bunch of guys and kind of man handling

the Golden State Warriors. That was really interesting game. Andrew Nemhardt, the same guy who executed the Los Angeles Lakers a couple of weeks ago, had the game of his life and we're gonna dive into that a little bit um and then the Los Angeles Clippers went into Charlotte and beat the Hornets last night on the strength of a game winner from Kawai Leonard and not a huge statistical performance from Kauai, but he more or less looked like Kauai with a couple of possessions at the end of

the game, which I thought was really incur jinks. So we're gonna do a little check in on the Los Angeles Clippers in the second half of the show. Also, we did release a video. It's the Anthony Davis Lakers segment from yesterday. But we're experimenting with using some footage and there were a lot of specific concepts that I talked about in that video, uh that we re kind of produced with the actual footage involved, So you can

find that on the Volumes YouTube feed. We're going to start doing something along those lines about once a week or twice a week from here on forward, just kind of experimenting with using real NBA footage. To check that out on the feed as well. You guys know the drill. Before we get started. Subscribe to the Volumes YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter and underscore Jason lt. So you guys

don't miss any show announcements. I was alive tweet through some games and things along those lines there and the last but not least, for whatever reason, you guys miss one of these shows and you can't get back over to YouTube to finish. You can find them wherever you get your podcasts under Hoops tonight. So in this game, the Pacers jumped out to a huge lead early. Uh, the Warriors made it a game twice, middle of the

second quarter, in the middle of the fourth quarter. Uh, the Warriors actually led one nine nine with less than five minutes left. But then from there Andrew Nampard step back three, lob dunke, Isaiah Jackson step back three, floating bank shot in the lane. Kind of very Steph Curry esque on that floating bank shot, all in pick and roll. The Warriors only scored two points during that span and the game was over. You know, it's funny because we talk a lot about pick and roll on this show.

It's one of the foundational concepts of NBA basketball these days. In terms of shot creation. We talked a lot about the different coverages that teams use, but also I'm fascinated personally. I'll just I've always been fascinated with skill sets and skill development. It's kind of what I do when I

coach my high school kids. It's been a huge thing, and just my love for the game manifests in a lot of ways of round skill sets and different dribble combinations and shot making and all the different things that it takes to be a successful score in any in any level of basketball, and specifically when it comes to pick and roll. As you guys know, I always talk about how you have to have a couple of very specific skills. You have to be able to shoot off

the dribble at all three levels. So if you're coming off the screen and the biggest too far back and the guard defender gets caught on the screen, you need to be able to knock down a pull up. Three. If the guard fights over the screen and you can use an escape dribble to get away from him, in the biggest steel too far back, you need to be able to hit a pull up eighteen foot twenty or

fifteen foot or somewhere along those lines. If the guard is actually chasing you over the top of the screen and applying back pressure and the biggest too far back. You need to be able to hit a floater in the lane, or you need to be enough of an athlete to attack a rim protector and finish through contact. And then if the if the big stays with the roll man, you need to be able to finish around the rim with either hand on any footwork that you

might need to use. And then from there you also have to be able to make high level passing reads. So if you engage the big, you need to be able to make a pocket pass or a lot pass

up towards the rim. If they help out of the weak side corner, you need to be able to make those slingshot one arm passes across the court to hit the shooter, or if there's a shooter relocating to the top of the key, or if it's like a pick and pop or something along those lines, you've got to be able to pass across your body to somebody who's

behind you. But if you can do all of those things, and you can do them at a really high level, then you can score and run pick and roll successfully in the n b A. And you know there's a lot of players like the overall skill level in the NBA right now is at a point where there's dozens and dozens and dozens of players who can do all of those things. Andrew Dampart isn't is an exciting rookie. You know, flashed a lot of this stuff when he was at Gonzaga. But he's not a guy that you

think of is like a prototypical lottery level high end creator. Right, He's not a guy that you think of as a future All Star. But he's a damn good basketball player. And if you allow him to get comfortable and allow him to get to his spots, he's got all of the necessary traits to make you pay for that. You know. It's funny, Um, that machine that all those different things that I was talking about was in full effect last night. This was crazy. I put this video together. You can

find it on my Twitter feeds. Go at Underscore. Jason LT scrolled down to the Andrew Nambart tweet. He ran thirty five pick and rolls last night against the Warriors and they resulted in fifty two points. That's almost one and a half points per possession. He just completely and utterly barbecued the Golden State Warriors and pick and roll.

On the season, he's been pretty solid, a hundred fourteen pick and rolls for a hundred seventy seventeen points, which is in the seventy percentile, but that was also elevated by his performance last night, So a good percentage of that is this was a below average pick and roll ball handler who had the night of his life at the expense of at the expense of a Warrior's defense that didn't bring the requisite effort. So I want to shout out Andrew and empar but also point out the

obvious fact that the Warriors weren't good enough. You know, in general, he was too comfortable getting to his jump shot. That means the guards weren't doing their job fighting over the top of screens. They were a handful of times that he got switches onto Kevan Luny. Cavan Luney was given him too much space, allowing him to step into shots too comfortably. The Warriors are an overhelped team and they got punished for over helping a lot during this

game off of shooters. You know, you could see it from the open just I'm sure all you Warriors fans noticed watching that game. There was a weird energy just kind of surrounding the whole team as the Pacers would go down and score, and then the Warriors would go down to miss a shot, and the Pacers would go down to score, and the Warriors would go down to miss a shot. Next thing, you know, it's like four and you have no momentum, and everything just kind of

feels clunky. And some of this is just the reality of the NBA schedule. You know, sometimes you've got to play a game against the lower level NBA set of talent. On a Monday night in December, Pacers were on a back to back. They were on a road trip where I believe they had lost all four games or they had only won one out of the five games, and that was against the Lakers. On that game winner, Tyrese

Haliburton was out, Miles Turner was out. They're starting some cast offs, right, Like Aaron E. Smith is a lottery pick from Boston that is in his second stint already with the Pacers. Same thing for Jalen Smith, a guy that was a lottery pick for Phoenix that they got rid of. So it's kind of like a weird vibe right where it's like, yeah, you're looking across the way, and it's a lot of lower level NBA players. But the truth of the matter is is those low level

NBA players are highly motivated. This is Ben Mathurin's first NBA start. You don't think he wants to bring a level effort again. Andrew Nambard is a rookie who's getting his for the first time, really getting the keys to an NBA offense to do whatever the hell he wants. He's excited about that opportunity to show what he can do. Jalen Smith again, former lottery pick, Aaron E. Smith, former

lottery pick. You don't think those guys realize that if they don't play really well and these types of situations, that they might not get another contract in the league. Like that's the kind of motivation they're facing. Meanwhile, the

Warriors are at home, they feel invincible. They're not going to be very motivated, and so it and you combine that with some other factors, like Steph just had a god awful shooting night and it wasn't you know, there was some tough shot selection in there, but there was like some airballs there was. His first shot of the game was a wide open twenty footer that Steph almost never misses that he missed. Jordan Pool had another game where his decision making was just all over the place,

and Andrew Wiggins is it there. So suddenly you're super thin on the wing and you're relying heavily on young players and you end up losing a game that you shouldn't lose, you know. And here's the thing, Like lots of Warriors fans are gonna point to the bench, and I saw lots of people calling for trades again last night. And again I'm not saying that those things aren't issues,

and they are and they need to be addressed. But the reality is is that your starters got your ass kicked again and you were in the lead with less than five minutes left, and you couldn't get a stop to a backup ball handler with a backup role man on an inferior basketball team. You fail for the trap game that happens. That these are trap games are in the NBA schedule, That happens to everybody. It's just in

the grand scheme of things. It's a lot harder to kind of like cope with that when your record isn't as good as it should be because this has happened a little bit too often, but at the end of the day, you just got to move on and play better. I mean that Warrior's lineup, like I said, is the best lineup in basketball this year. They need to be held to the standard that they should be able to get stops on Andrew Nemhard and and and win a

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Paul George had a cool sequence in this game. Um Terry Rozier had a really nice pull up jump shot on the right baseline to put the Hornets up one seventeen one fift. Hornets are a weird team. They can't score, but they have tons of length and athleticism like Kelly U. Brady leads the league and deflections. They've got all this athleticism.

They're kind of like scrappy. They're not what you would expect from the old school Hornets, which were a lot more offensive skilled and couldn't get stops and had a lot of guys that you you know, had injury issues. This is like a young, freaky athletic, kind of fun

to watch team. And they had a two point lead with under a minute left and Marcus Morris ended up getting a wide open three on the right wing that he missed, and Paul George just massive winning type of play where the there's kind of like a contested rebound, he just jumps up and taps it to Kawhi lan Or directly under the basket, easy lay up to tie it. And by the way, that's that's a the second time that Paul George has made kind of like a hustle play that helped his team win a game this year.

I can't remember specifically which team it was. Oh yeah, I was against the Calves when Jared Allen tried to make that lay up on that drop off pass and Paul George just made that one extra effort that ended up forcing a stop which led to a run out in a Clippers basket. Like Paul George, you know, rightfully got criticized a lot for some of his lack of success in Oklahoma City. Towards the end with Indiana, he's turned into a damn good, like just kind of gritty,

scrappy winning player in this league. It just can't stay healthy long enough for it to matter. But then Kawhi leonards one seventeen, one seventeen, they go down, uh the Hornets end of uh generating a wide open three. I believe it was either for PJ. Washington or Jalen McDaniels, but they missed a wide open three. Clippers don't call

a time out. They go down the floor. Kauai ISOs on the right, uh block a right kind of like extended short corner block area, and uh Kauai just goes through kind of like a really nifty kind of like jab step high gather um. Uh. That kind of gets Jalen McDaniels to buckle a little bit, and then he just hits like a jab step and gets enough separation and knocks down an eighteen foot or game over. It's a season high sixteen points on fifteen shots for Kauai.

Still clearly a little bit out of rhythm, not quite the efficiency you expect from him. He had like a step back three on the right wing a little bit earlier in the fourth quarter that was like two ft too long and a foot too far to the left. It's just a brick. Damn ever put a hole in the backboard. That's like one of those moves that Kawhi Leonard like when he's really got it going, that's either are going in the basket or he's just barely missing

it short long, you know, something like that. Um But overall that's rhythm related. I think his legs actually looked as good last night as they've looked all season. There was a specific play I clipped this play. You can

find it on my Twitter feed. It's I just say, it's the one that just has the caption that says, Kawhi Leonard looking like Kawhi Leonard, and he's is suing on Jala McDaniels out of the left corner, and he does a hard jab step dribble towards the baseline, gets cut off, crosses back over with the retreat dribble, and then takes three dribbles into the lane and elevates over the top and gets tons of separation and knocks down like a fifteen foot jumper right around the foul line,

and I was like, Wow, that looks like Kawhi Leonard. And it's one of those things where it's gonna take time. You know, he's gonna have to get to the point where he's got his conditioning and rhythm where it can be where he can consistently play eight minutes a night at a high level for the Clippers to really crawl into that more serious conversation at the top of the West.

But it's baby steps here, especially with all of his injury history, and I thought last night was a good baby step in the right direction in terms of the way his athleticism looked. Game winner ends a two game skid for the Clippers. Their fourteen and eleven they're the sixth seed in the West right now. There's still twenty

eight in offense, but their fifth in defense. Let's just put it this way in terms of their injury luck, the Clippers have played twenty five games and Paul George and Kwai Leonard have combined to play in twenty three of them, so they're two best players have combined to play in less than the total number of games that the team has played this year. They're also having a really tough shooting season. So last year they were one

of the best jump shooting teams in the league. They were third and three point percentage twelve and three point makes per one possessions. This year there seventeenth the makes and percentage. Outside of Luke Canard, who continues to just shoot the laces off the basketball sware every time he

gets a good look, it's going in. Outside of Luke Nard and Brandon Boston, who really isn't in their rotation, every single Clippers player is shooting below from three, and this is a good shooting team from his from like a talent standpoint, So even despite all the injuries, their offense should probably be a little bit better than even than it has been there probably due for some positive regression, and shooting really is going to be the big thing

that helps them. I don't think it's a coincidence that Luke and Ard has been their best plus minus guy when he's shooting the laces off the damn basketball and the team is struggling so much to score. You know. The thing is is that with Paul George and Kawhile Leonard being out, a great deal of the ball handling responsibilities have fallen on Reggie Jackson and John Well, and

both of them just haven't been very good. Reggie's below average and pick and roll this year zero point nine six point per possession uh including passes and an iceo zero point nine two points per possession, just not quite the player that he was a couple of years ago.

And then John Wall, it's like, you know, he has these moments where like you'll hit the jets in transition and get all the way to the rim for a layup, or he'll draw a foul, or he'll collapse the defense and make a really nice pass to a shooter, and you're like, oh man, that looks kind of like John Wall. But the totals in terms of the shot result or team result per action that he runs are not good.

Zero point nine five points possession and pick and roll which is below average, and zero point seven six points per possession and ISO i'm pretty decent volume, which is horrible. So really, I mean, all of it comes back to Kawhi Leonard and Paul George. I do believe they'll start shooting better. I'm a huge believer in their set of role players, but you need that top end talent. I'd I would use the Lakers as an example. For instance, the Clippers have much more talent on the roster than

the Los Angeles or than the Lakers. They've got wings that can shoot and dribble. They've got these guards that can get consistent dribble penetration. But at the end of the day, their overall shot quality isn't good enough because they're not consistently getting in the getting the defense and rotation, because they don't have the super duper stars and their ability to truly warp the defense and create high quality

shots for everybody else. Look at how Lebron and a d like hit a groove and added that shot making piece, that like ability to hit shots over the top of the defense. Because that's the thing with the Clippers too. It's not just about getting that initial advantage to get guys good spot up opportunities. You need Paul George and Kawhi Leonard to hit a three dribble pull up at the free throw line in the fourth quarter. You need Paul George hitting that classic fade away along the baseline,

like you need shot making to help rescue possessions. Like again, if you look at offensive ratings, you know the best team in the league might be eighteen points possession, but the worst team in the league is not that far behind. You know, they're still scoring a hundred you know, seven points per possession or points per hunter possession or whatever

it is. So it's like, really that the difference between those two outcomes might be shot making and just having four or five possessions a game where dude just rises up over good defense and knocks down a shot. And so when you're two stars Kawai and Paul George are missing more than half of their potential games, it's gonna be really hard for you to hang with teams offensively.

But this is a credit to Taylu into the organization as a whole in terms of their competence, because in spite of all of that, you're sitting at fourteen and eleven, your solidly, solidly in the playoff. Hunt the West is such a ship show that you can easily recover. That's

what it takes. Competent management that provides your roster with quality players that fit a modern scheme, a coach that actually recommends and promotes that modern scheme, you know, and Tyler too, like he's big on switching he's big on that spread spread pick and roll spread is so. But I've also been really impressed with a lot of the sets that they've been running lately, which they've had to lean on a lot more because they haven't had the

top end talent. They run this like variation of Spain pick and roll, where instead of the big man rolling to the basket, he'll just roll into a screen for like Luke Kennard or some other shooter coming out of the right wing, and they end up getting a ton of good looks out of that because typically that screen defender is staying back and so essentially Luke Nard is getting a flare screen with no help or no hedge or anything. He's getting a lot of good looks out

of that. Tyler is just manufactured wins with this screwup, despite being down a ton of players. But the optimistic look is again sixth place in the standings, three games over five hundred. Kawhi last night looked better physically than he had all season. Paul George first game back looked pretty good. The reinforcements are coming, and your shot results should get better. Guys should shoot better than they have been so far this season. That's the advantage of being

competent as an organization from the top down. For the Lakers, they're superstars played like super duperstars to crawl back to ten and eleven because of organizational incompetency. The Clippers not even really getting that from their stars, hoping to get it in the future. Fourteen and eleven deep roster filled with modern basketball players and excellent coach, excellent management. Al Right, guys, that is all I have for today. As always, I

sincerely appreciate your support. Don't forget to check out that Anthony David's video. We also have one coming out with some footage on Zai and Williamson and the Pelicans, so he and eye on that as well. As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys support and I will see you tomorrow. The volume m