‘LEGACY-DEFINING FINALS’ 🤩 Previewing the 2024 NBA Finals 🏆 | NBA Today

‘LEGACY-DEFINING FINALS’ 🤩 Previewing the 2024 NBA Finals 🏆 | NBA Today

24 NBA Finals they are set Luca in the maps will square off against Jason Tatum in the Celtics and there are plenty of story lines to dive into my friends let’s start with Tatum and Luca they’ve carried their teams to this point right both members of First Team all NBA they LED their squads in points in rebounds and assist this postseason making this the first ever finals match up between two players to do that and while these finals they have plenty of star power right there may be even more drama because Kyrie he’s going to be back in Boston where he’s not only lost 10 straight but remember the the burning of Sage flipping off Celtics fans stomping on Lucky the logo at Center Court yeah all that but he’s been a star I mean nailing huge shots on finals teams before he’s a top tier running mate again Luca is four wins away from being the first scoring champ to Hoist the Larry O’Brien trophy since sha in 2000 speaking of Larry he’s here with us welcome to NBA Today presented by ESPN bet we see your dynamic duo Dallas I raise you a terrific Trio that we have here Andrea Carter Richard Jefferson and ch okay all here Zack L will be by shortly as well I’m Malika Andrew now that we know the matchup though Rich what are you looking for what are you most excited for in these finals no I think there’s a lot of interesting legacies that can be made when you look at Jason Tatum finally getting over that hump with the historic Boston Celtics Kyrie winning a championship without LeBron and getting back to the finals Luca possibly winning his first championship and cementing himself as one of this generation’s great there are so many things Jason Kid Joe missou there is so much on the line across across the board I don’t think we have seen a situation like this in a long time we’ve been waiting for the moment when Luca donic takes over the NBA is this that moment is this the moment where that happens Luca’s oxygen is taking the life stealing the life from his opponents and we saw this in a grand fashion he has the most points per game after a loss in NBA postseason history and more importantly it doesn’t matter who’s guarding him who’s on the bench who’s in the stands that is feeding the Beast feeding the monster that is Luca donic has that moment finally arrived where he has taken things personally and it’s worked to the better for his legacy as you said Richard listen Boston fans just don’t start talking to Luca that only makes him it’s literally poking the bear he’s built like a bear it’s poking the bear for me when it comes to this finals it’s the backcourt Duos the Batman and Robin the one-two punch that both teams have Jason Tatum and Jaylen Brown and then you’ve got Luca donic and Kyrie Irving those two backcourt Duos going at it unbelievable so before we continue to look forward I just want to look take a look back right at How the West Was W so let’s go now to Minneapolis uh where Luca and Kyrie they meant Business from The Jump the Mavs looking to close this out after they were not able to at home Luca averages more than 34 points in the playoffs after a loss stop just got to laugh Rich you can’t guard that and look what I love about great players is when they come out and set the tone follow my lead and everything is going to be okay when he comes out and is this aggressive knocking down shots look yeah after a loss we’ve talked about how his points per game and what they look like but it was just the management of the logo bro yeah like Minnesota fans were like uh-oh the building went real quiet real quick for a minute there he couldn’t miss well yeah that’s what Luca is he is one of those defining players that will take over a moment and there’s nothing else you can do about it the sad thing in this series the only other person that could do it was on his team right Kyrie Irving he was five for five in the second quarter and he put on a master class these two guys Luca and Kyrie they had experience and it show that guy right there has the best handle in NBA history that guy right there has been battle tested and guess what when he’s in isolation when he’s moving the ball around he’s able to be his best self because he does he knows nothing but attack Kyrie Irving 15 points in the second quarter so the Mavs up huge we don’t need to keep raing the score Andrea that’s just rude yeah don’t don’t worry about the score okay it was embarrassing at one point it was extremely disappointing the the Irving cross over to the left and then he hops back right I still can’t get over that sleep that’s all he’s trying to do neither can the defense donic gets go and a little floater there he had a Runway a complete Runway to the basket but I love this he’s telling his team keep going keep going don’t take your foot off the gas Andrea just because we’re up by a ton that was my favorite part and that was right after Anthony Edwards was very annoyed with Rudy goar for not getting up on so you got one side superstar that was frustrated and the other side super is like oh yeah another St enjoy theoy the all Snoop can do is laugh and compliments to Luca we have seen him increasingly frustrated over the course of this post but when you have your two superstars go 10 for 20 from three they’re shooting 50% there there is nothing to look at we’ve been watching that that’s just what he even LCA though can’t believe it on that one hitting us with a little MJ shrug like yeah I’m like that I think we beat three very very very good teams uh and not having home Home Advantage which is which is pretty good for us it has been seven long years but it’s it’s also felt like um the right amount of time you know in order to uh reward myself be in the locker room with my teammates and enjoying it um long time coming so we are going to enjoy this but we obviously know this just a pit stop in the journey and we got to get ready for uh you know that Court turning gold as I as I like to say you know the shoes turn gold the uh jerseys turn gold and um you know as a kid that’s what you dream of uh getting to is uh the finals and being able to play against the best of the best with the whole world watching all right so Andrea Luca was named the MVP at the Western Conference Finals but it goes way beyond that look at this every single category first first first first first what did you see from him this postseason well I saw Brilliance from Luca D this postseason but when I played basketball and I went up against a superstar my coaches always said you have to make the star show how good they are every shot has to be difficult right Minnesota did not do that to Luca doners let’s give Luca credit because he made incredible plays but there were some plays where I was so confused on what Minnesota was doing as far as making it easy for Luca watch this now Richard you said you can’t guard this you can guard it a lot harder than this look at all this space watch Anthony Edwards just die on the screen Luca walks right in to a three-point shot that’s just simply too easy for Luca D then here straight Runway down the line luuka could stop and sip tea before he shoots the ball he’s got so much time and space to score it’s simply too easy there were so many plays life cannot be that easy for a superstar like Luca donin and it’s not like he just became a superstar he’s been doing this the youngest player ever to play with Real Madrid over in Europe Euroleague MVP at 19 years old he’s ready for this moment if you’re the defense let’s pivot forward to Boston you have to make life more difficult on Luca donic you cannot give him anything easy he got a lot of easy opportunities last night particular because as you can see he is not new to this he is True to this he has been playing at a high level as a pro since he was essentially a teenager 13 years old you know what I was doing at 13 we don’t okay yeah not that about that I’ll talk about what I was doing the 13 years old here on on NBA Today Zack low as promised joining us now as well Zach we’re talking here about the Ascension of Luca donic what have you seen from him the guy is barely 25 years old that’s the scary part where this this guy is going to rank all time there’s almost NE no ceiling on it if he stays healthy but right now he has every shot in every pass and he’s 67 and big and strong and that means he can get anywhere he wants against any defense any scheme he has seen everything and he is about to see a bunch of different defenses from what may be the best or second best defense in the league and the most versatile defense in the league and guess what he’s going to figure out the answer to all of them within one possession because if he’s making his floaters and his step back jumpers there’s just almost nothing you can do with him except mix it up because if you Blitz him he’s just going to make the right play every time and the MS are going to get good shots out of if you drop back he’s going to prod and prod and get those floaters and those lobs he manipulates the very best defenses because he’s big enough with enough Vision he has every pass in the book to get whatever he wants once he figures out what you’re trying to do this guy is a terrifying offensive Force it’s him and joic as the two best offensive players in the league and if Dallas is going to beat Boston it’s going to start with Luca being the best player in the series by a pretty decent margin and and he is the best player in this series by a decent Martian but we have to understand the standard is still the standard everybody was ready to Crown Anthony Edwards as as the next MJ and again the future face of the league I’m not going to talk about that because there is no handing that or something someone taking that that comes from years of work put in Luca has an opportunity to kind of increase this narrative we just saw up on that Big Board he’s been doing this for a very very long time he still has to win a championship we can’t put him amongst the great statistically he is one of the greats that we have ever seen already statistically but we know that the standard that we hold for LeBron James Kobe Bryant Michael Jordan all of those guys were statistical monsters but then they took over the league from a winning and Championship domination stand he’s already been to the Western Conference Finals he got one step further and now it’s like the Luca show it is it has an opportunity to be the Luca show and now we get to all watch History transpire so let’s say that they do win it all let’s say that Dallas takes takes the throne do you think that LCA donic becomes is he is he the best player in the NBA look I think legacies are predicated on winning championships and the cool thing about this finals matchup is we’ve seen two instances where one can go Boston’s way with their young stars and one can go Dallas’s way now I still think that Nika yic is the best player until someone else proves they can win and dominate and Luca has one more series away before he makes a really great case Richard really quickly I still stand by this Luca doesn’t have an MVP he doesn’t have an MVP when we talk about Giannis when we talk about Luca we’re talking about five MVPs in two championships getting him in a championship gets him in the conversation the world right getting him there gets him amongst the conversations but he’s got a long way to go in my opinion before he is the best most dominant player in this league and I think the reason why he doesn’t have an MVP is because after the trade deadline we saw a better team if they had this team at the start of the year then maybe the every time we come in every season we say Lucas should be MVP but the team did not back it up now he has the team to back it up maybe he misses MVP and gets championship and that might even matter even more I will say he puts up 35 15 and 12 against the Boston Celtics if you’re into that kind of you’re into that kind of stuff the Celtics did win both of their matchups in the season [Music]

Andraya Carter, Richard Jefferson, Chiney Ogwumike, Malika Andrews and Zach Lowe react to the Dallas Mavericks making the NBA Finals after a Game 5 domination over the Minnesota Timberwolves. Also, they preview the 2024 Finals matchup between the Mavs and the Boston Celtics.

0:00 Previewing the NBA Finals
2:33 WCF Game 5 highlights
4:49 Luka & Kyrie’s reactions
5:30 Doncic’s “brilliance” this postseason
7:18 Zach Lowe joins the show

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