Lethargic vs Groovy 1st Seeds
Disappointing Celtics and Ruthless Thunder
Wednesday brought us two final Game 2s. Both of them happened between the 1st and 8th seed in the conference.
But my main takeaway from those games are super polarized.
OKC - NOP Game 2
Jonas Valanciunas put up 19 points in this game, including 11 in the first quarter, but in the end, his minutes turned out to be the worst for the Pelicans. They tried to exploit Chet Holmgren’s lean body and tried to push him through Jonas, which he did just partly because 5/10 versus Chet isn’t a pure win. The main issue is that Jonas is a complete black hole defensively for the Pelicans. They kept running pick and pop one after another, and Jonas was cemented to the floor while Holmgren was draining wide-open 3-pointers. Granted, the Thunder were red hot behind the 3-point from the start, while the Pelicans kept missing one after another despite having some good opportunities.
The only time the Pels looked good defensively with Jonas on the court was when they tried to pull off a 2-3 zone. That’s only because he could camp in the paint, but the front two guards didn’t play as good of a role as the Heat can sometimes for example - and the Thunder managed to crack the zone with yet more good 3-point looks.
The other minutes go to Larry Nance Jr. and they bring a different scheme. The Pels change it up with either blitzing/hedging or straight-up switching. When the Pels switch the easiest target to attack is CJ McCollum who doesn’t have it on the defensive side anymore. The Thunder scored 14/17 field goal attempts when he was one of the defenders.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander was balling. It didn’t matter who was defending him, he kept going at Pels’ player and performed his usual short mid-range magic with a variety of fadeaways, step backs, pull-ups, etc… The scary part is that there is basically another Shai in the Thunder team. At the start of the 2nd and 4th quarters, Jalen Williams takes the offensive reins in his hands and straight up dominates the court. He’s more of a line-drive player compared to Shai though.
Anyway, I feel like the Pelicans have only 4th best player in this series and the gap to him is quite big. They could compete with the Thunder if their shot starts falling, but systematically they aren’t pulling the perfect moves at the moment that could optimize their win percentage. In my opinion, they should start gambling more on Giddey missing.
Also, if they could stop doing illegal screens, that’d be great. 7 offensive fouls by the Pels is perhaps some sort of a record. I should check that.
BOS - MIA Game 2
This was a really weird game. I kept waiting for the Celtics to get serious and just take over the game by switching to a higher gear. Throughout the first half and early 3rd quarter, it felt like they were completely in control and just messing around.
Because, even though Miami was either always tied, or slightly ahead, the Celtics kept going at them through the paint, and were scoring quite easily. They ran the ball and pushed the tempo well in the first half, and that kept them close score-wise. Both paints were wide open and depended on perimeter defense, as the matchups were odd. Porzingis and Adebayo didn’t do much of rim defending.
But as the game went into the 2nd half, they continued to do soft contests, not close out on players that were already ridiculously hot, and kept half-assing their offensive possessions. I would be furious as a Celtics fan.
Most of the blame could fall on the shoulders of Kristaps Porzingis who was just 1/9 from the field and was either the main culprit or at least partly at fault for the bad entry passes to the post up. But he shouldn’t be clowned in a way people started to do so on Reddit, Twitter, etc…
Because the entire team’s approach was embarrassing. Miami Heat shot 15-23 on WIDE OPEN 3-point attempts. In contrast, the Celtics attempted only 9 wide open 3-point shots.
Look at the game clock in this play. 6 minutes left in the 4th. No contest on the shot by none other than Jrue Holiday, who is one of the best defenders in the league. This is just inexcusable to me. Also, the Heat ran this play about 4 or 5 times with different endings. Guard-to-guard screen following a pick-and-roll. They always found something.
There are dozens of plays like this, and the usual culprits are Jrue, Jaylen Brown (most common), and Kristaps Porzingis. I don’t really blame Kristaps, as he’s probably instructed to stay in the drop, but a reaction has to come from someone - most likely from Joe Mazzulla.
I don’t really have many complaints about the offense, yes the turnovers sucked, yes the Celtics went on and shot way too many early threes while being down, and yes they didn’t really have an easy get-out-of-jail-free card like they never really do. But in the 3rd quarter, Jayson Tatum should have returned to the game earlier, because he is their best shot-creator, both individually and team-wise.
Tyler Herro was amazing for the Heat, he solved all soft double teams with ease and kept finding wide-open players on the weak side, or Adebayo on a roll. Bam Adebayo was great as well, he scored when the going got tough in empty side post ups, something that just wasn’t falling for the Celtics tonight.
I really don’t think there should be room for panic for the Celtics, but they need to get more serious with the approach - it sounds cliche but it was painfully obvious from the get-go.