NBA 2018-19, Part IV: Pete and Threepeat are sitting on a fence

[Kingspoint]

It took 8 minutes. Both possibly earned, though.

[dubc47834]

NBA specially flew in Scott Foster as lead official for game 2. He didn't ref game 1m Foster is the most biased official against Portland. I predict two quick fouls against Kanter.

Excuses are starting early tonite...

[M2]

Jamal Murray must have had himself a triple espresso before the 4th quarter tonight.

[dubc47834]

Good playoff basketball in this 1st half!!!

[Kingspoint]

Excuses are starting early tonite...

No excuses. You win or lose regardless of the refs.

[Kingspoint]

Too mamy fouls on both teams. Refs need to let them play.

[Kingspoint]

Blazahs!!!

[ScotlandRed]

Westbrook 5-20 shooting ain’t gonna cut it in the playoffs.

[Kingspoint]

So, OKC decided to double-team Kanter on all rebounding opportunities. It worked as the two teams battled evenly on the boards. C.J., Lillard, Moe and Aminu picked up the slack, but it wasn't enough to give Portland an edge there, traditionally one of their strengths.

The key to the game was Lillard's shutdown Defensive job he did on Westbrook the entire game. He was 5-20 because of Lillard's Defensive effort. It wouldn't surprise me if Lillard had a Defensive Rating of around 96-97 last night, if anyone knows how to find that information.

[Kingspoint]

So, OKC decided to double-team Kanter on all rebounding opportunities. It worked as the two teams battled evenly on the boards. C.J., Lillard, Moe and Aminu picked up the slack, but it wasn't enough to give Portland an edge there, traditionally one of their strengths.

The key to the game was Lillard's shutdown Defensive job he did on Westbrook the entire game. He was 5-20 because of Lillard's Defensive effort. It wouldn't surprise me if Lillard had a Defensive Rating of around 96-97 last night, if anyone knows how to find that information.

Lillard's Defensive Rating was 97.5 w/ a Net Rating of 32.5 in 36.7 min.

https://stats.nba.com/players/advanc...s&LastNGames=1

Defensive Ratings from last night:

Players guarding George most of the time:

Harkless: 92.3 w/ a Net Rating of 31.5 in 28.5 min.
Aminu: 94.3 w/ a Net Rating of 26.4 in 23.2 min.
Hood: 79.2 w/ a Net Rating of 13.2 in 25.5 min.

Meyers Leonard, who played well enough to stay on the floor from the time Kanter got his 4th foul until 3 minutes left when the white flag went up: 96.6 w/ a Net Rating of 58.6 in 14.7 min.

McCollum: 87.5 w/ a Net Rating of 30.2 in 36.3 min.
Kanter: 89.4 w/ a Net Rating of 28.0 in 19.8 min.

Key OKC players:

Westbrook: 126.3 w/ a Net Rating of -36.0 in 37.1 min.
George: 109.1 w/ a Net Rating of -12.5 in 40.6 min.
Grant: 128.4 w/ a Net Rating of -40.1 in 30.2 min.
Schroder: 120.0 w/ a Net Rating of -35.6 in 20.9 min.
Adams: 126.5 w/ a Net Rating of -30.9 in 30.4 min.
Ferguson: 123.8 w/ a Net Rating of -29.9 in 30.2 min.

[BuckeyeRed27]

Jazz gonna get swept.

[Revering4Blue]

A look at the #Pacers shotchart in the 4Q. They were 0-for-9 on 2-point shots and seven of those were basically at the rim. Bogdanovic was 2-for-6, rest of #Pacers 2-for-11.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D4Zr5McXsAAD2c4.png:large

[BuckeyeRed27]

Utah isn’t playing too bad offensively, they just can’t shoot at all. Missed a ton of wide open shots.

Defensively they are lost and aren’t showing any signs they know what to do.

I’d try a Mitchell, Ingles, ONeale, Crowder, Gobert lineup and see how it goes. Rubio can’t shoot and is getting abused by Harden. Favors and Gobert together just isn’t an option against this lineup.

[Kingspoint]

A look at the #Pacers shotchart in the 4Q. They were 0-for-9 on 2-point shots and seven of those were basically at the rim. Bogdanovic was 2-for-6, rest of #Pacers 2-for-11.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D4Zr5McXsAAD2c4.png:large

That's ridiculous.

[Stray]

Utah isn’t playing too bad offensively, they just can’t shoot at all. Missed a ton of wide open shots.

Defensively they are lost and aren’t showing any signs they know what to do.

I’d try a Mitchell, Ingles, ONeale, Crowder, Gobert lineup and see how it goes. Rubio can’t shoot and is getting abused by Harden. Favors and Gobert together just isn’t an option against this lineup.

I didn't think Rubio was terrible defensively tonight. He contested a lot of those shots about as well as they can be contested. Harden is just ridiculous. And if the other guys like PJ Tucker are making everything it's just almost impossible to beat this Rockets team.

But yeah they created and missed a whole bunch of wide open shots.