Has momentum swung to Boston after their Game 5 win vs. Knicks? | NBA Today

Has momentum swung to Boston after their Game 5 win vs. Knicks? | NBA Today

After winning game five, the Celtics improved to 10-2 this season in games without Jason Tatum, including both the regular season and the playoffs. Now, that equates to a 68 win pace over 82 games. So, Perk, who stood on business? [Music] This my camera. That’s going to be your camera. Standing on business, John, you better stand on business. Stand on business. Hell yeah. We standing on business today. Standing on business. Hello world. No, it’s not Boris Chestnut. This is a big deal. Hey, listen. The Celtics went out there and they won in great fashion. Damn it. Jaylen Brown, Derek White, they ball. Payton Pritchard came up big, but you know who stood on business, the big fella in the middle. Not Chris Porzingis, but Luke Carnett. Seven blocks out playing Carl Anthony Towns anchoring that defense. I thought I was watching Victor Wimpy yesterday. The way he was aching that defense, getting out, listen on the perimeter, blocking shots, covering space. I’m like, “Oh, this big fella is feeling it.” And look, he enjoyed Elite Company. Wait, wait, wait. You got Robert Williams III with nine in 2021. Luke Cornette last night, Robin Parish, one of the all-time greats. And you got this handsome young man right here, Kendrick Perkins in 2009 in the postseason. And the film no lie. Matter of fact, this was against the Bulls. One of the best playoff series ever in the history of the game. It went seven games. And look at the big fella. This the no beard perk right here. Shining like new money. The little reverse layup. Here we go. Here we go. Screws at the rim. 43 in the building. Hey, look. I know the Boston fans been pissed off at at me, but if you’re watching, that was a reminder of what the big fella Big Perk did. But Luke Carnett, boy, you stood on business last night. Perk, you’re the only one in that graphic that wasn’t smiling, man. You’re you’re a you got a beautiful smile, man. The Celtics have been at their best with their backs against the wall, going nine and two in their last 11 when facing eliminations over the last four postseasons. No other team has more than four such wins in that span of time. All right. Now joining us here on NBA today, the host of the Hoop Collective podcast, our senior writer who has been covering this series, Brian Winhorse. Wendy, you were at TD Garden last night. Has momentum swung in this series as we head to game six? I can’t go far as saying that. I got to see some more. But I do think one of the things that happened last night was Boston had an advantage. And I know that that sounds odd, but the Knicks had gotten used to a certain way that they played against the Celtics. They had played them eight times, and the way Boston played yesterday was very different. Jaylen Brown played a point forward role that we really hadn’t seen him play before. That’s how he ended up with 12 assists. He’d never had that many assists in a game in his career. He was distributing the ball. There was a lot more uh player and ball movement than than the Celtics usually have because Jason Tatum runs so many ISOs in a regular game. There was great three-point shooting. And then of course you had Luke Cornette. They did not game plan for Luke Cornette to play almost the entire second half. And the big difference there guys was that when the Celtics went to their bench, they had Chris Haps Porzingis and he was frankly and I know he’s under the weather. He was getting dominated by Mitchell Robinson. What was happening was Mitchell Robinson was owning the minutes when he was in the game with Luke Cornett who was at 100%. The entire thing changed. He was a differencemaker and that was also not part of the Knicks game plan. So the Knicks get this day today to retrofit and learn how the new Boston Celtics are going to operate. Yeah. But their fans also have to stew and worry about all the things that have happened in the past, including the Celtics being right at home at MSG over the last quarter century. They’re 38 and 18 at the Garden and man, that’s better than their home record over the last 25 years. All right, let’s bring in the rest of our panel. So, Mark, what are the chances that the Celtics become the 14th team to come back down 3-1? I got a message for the Knicks. What they say in Mortal Kombat, finish them. Yeah, finish them. Yeah, need to finish them because you don’t want to go back to the Garden. You know, Oracle was the toughest place. Oracle’s dead. Boston, the Parkquay, the the Banners. They’re 22 and six all time in game sevens. You know, the leprechaun’s going to show up and sit on the rim. You don’t want to go back there. The fans show up 30 minutes before in games like that. It’s an intimidating place. Finish him in New York or you’re in trouble. You’re going back to the crib. Jason Tatum is out. The New York Knicks have the better duo right now. We’ll call Anthony Towns and Jaylen Brunson. Jaylen Brunson has to be better defensively, right? They were trying to search him out. Call Anthony Town. Stop out. This is an opportunity for you to become a Nick. Like, officially become a Nick, right? Go impose your will, bro. No more Luke Carnett outplaying you. Like, no more pouting. None of those dumbass fouls you picking up. Sprint your ass up and down the damn floor. Play with some damn energy and some damn heart. Right. You’re going home. You’re an emotional guy. That building is going to be rocking. I expect him to feed off emotions. I’m looking at Jaylen Brunson and call Anthony Towns. Take him home in game six. Go ahead, Wendy. Yeah. So, I think a big thing that the Celtics are saying as they come out having lost Jason Tatum, they’re really leaning into defense. I know that’s not what ended up happening last night because they had a hot shooting night. The Celtics know their only way forward through this series is is to defend. And we can run all the offensive numbers, but really what happened last night, Jaylen Brunson was in foul trouble. Carl Towns was in foul trouble, and they shot 35% as a team. The Knicks can get some better offense at home. They should be in good position to have a chance to to take the series. All right, so Minnesota took up that challenge from Coach Finch. They’re back in the West finals. UD, we’ll start with you. What did they show you in this series? They showed me that they my they my favorite to win it all. You know, why can’t they go for it all last year? Dallas caught lightning in the bottle at a number five seed. Why can’t they do it this year with a number six seed? They have a superstar. They made a move that’s working out for them. They have lengthy defenders on the wing. They have toughness with Julius Randall. They have a rim protector with Rudy Goel. And let’s just say one thing about Rudy Goel. We going to have to give him his flowers cuz there was times where you couldn’t play Rudy Go in playoff series. He figured out a way to stay on the floor in his first series against the Lakers. He’s figured out a way to stay on the floor in this series. They have the six former six man of the year in Nas Reed. So they can go small if they need to. This team literally has everything they want. The domination that they had over the Golden State Warriors, I didn’t think that with with Steph being out, I didn’t think that it would be dominated like that. But what I did know that they would win that series. So I think this team has it all and they my favorite to win it all. Now I say another thing, the team that has won six out of the last championships has been the team that sent Jimmy Butler home. Okay, look at that stat. Who needs stats and info group here? You got UD’s info. Okay. Now, Perk, Chris Finch earlier in this series challenged Anthony Edwards, right, in regards to his leadership, saying he needed to be the spark, the tone setter of this team. What did Anthony Edwards show you? Well, guess what? He didn’t run from the challenge. He actually accepted the challenge as he’s been accepting challenges for the last two seasons. You know what I mean? Who who has he sent home? The King Slayer. He’s been sending home everybody. Look at this list. KD Booker check Bill check Mack Ron check Luca check Steph ain’t no sort of he’s part of the squad butler Draymond who’s next I keep hearing footsteps baby in the dark oh in the dark hey they hear them footsteps around the league of Anthony Edwards They him cuz he coming. Who’s next? Is it SGA again? Is it SGA who’s going to win the MVP? Is it Jokic? Anthony Elvis is not satisfied. He been there before. This is old news. Old news being in the conference finals. That man trying to go win something. He’s trying to go win a championship. And everyone keeps saying, “Oh, Anthony Elvis, he need to elevate his game more and he he need to level up some more.” Man, the man is playing some outstanding basketball as a floor general. Can we talk about how he’s transitioned himself from just being a two guard scorer, right, to all of a sudden being basically the point guard, right? He’s seen every defense, the Lakers, the two-3 zone. They trapped him. They put Brun on them. They put Vanderbilt on them. All of a sudden, we saw 131 zone out of out of the Golden State Warriors. They trapped him. Pajyp, they tried everybody. He made the right play, right decision, empowering his teammates. Julius Randle playing with confidence. Rudy Gober playing with an edge. All of these guys are doing it at a high level. And it’s because of Anthony. This man is on a damn mission right now. You mentioned Julius Randall. Let’s take a look at Julius Randall who has increased his regular season scoring average by over five points per game in the playoffs. As you can see here, you know, earlier this season, Julius Riddle didn’t feel like a perfect fit necessarily. Mark, what changed? What changed was during that time, injury time off. He had about most of February, the All-Star break. You got to remember when he got traded there, it was right before camp. Wife was pregnant. Kid was about to start school on and off the court. It was a struggle. But when he was able to sit and watch and figure out the rules when he came back late late February, this is what you’re getting now. This is the Jaylen Brown of this year. This is the Scotty Pippen of the Timberwolves. This is a, you know, somebody that can challenge Edwards, dare I say, for finals MVP. 24, as you said, he he’s he’s also playing on defensive end. LeBron was 10 of 27 shooting. Jimmy Butler missed 1011 shots against him. He’s playing on both ends of the floor. You can see it in his actions. He’s been incredible. Julius Randall is is it. He’s there. He’s that guy. He’s the basically the Batman the Robin that the Warriors was talking about. Now the Timberwolves have that. Tim, you just got back from shootound. What’s OKC’s mindset heading into a potential clinching game tonight? Howdy, George. I think you go back to when they were down 2-1, when they lost game three here. We talked to Alex Caruso the next day. He said, “I just know that the Denver Nuggets, this proven championship team, is the challenge that’s going to bring the greatness out of this group, this young team that won 68 games. They responded to that challenge down to one, were able to win the next couple games. They’ve proven they can handle adversity. They know this is going to be the biggest challenge yet. You’re trying to close out Nicole Yokic, Jamal Murray, the Denver Nuggets on their home court. And look, this isn’t a Thunder team that gets reel up, reel down, very focused, very mature. They know exactly what kind of challenge they have ahead of them tonight here in Denver. To your point, Tim, their head coach, Mark DNA, likes to say that after games, they like to get back to a neutral state of mind. So, to your point, not too high, not too low, don’t matter about dwelling about the past, good or bad, doesn’t matter. Now, OKC hasn’t played in a lot of these tight games this season, clutch games this season. They’ve only played in 24 in the regular season. They’ve played three in this series alone. They won that last one or last couple now actually. So, two in a row. What do they have? What have they seen from SGA particularly in those tight games the last couple of times out? Yeah. Do you remember game three, they did not get it done in crunch time. He’s getting taunted by Nuggets. Fans walking off the floor. What’d he do? He had a big smile and he talked about he knows he gets another chance that you know he gets to prove himself the next game, the next game. The way that they’ve played down the stretch in these last couple games, especially with Shay Gilders Alexander, like the guy is cool. He’s confident and you know, Caruso today talked about the unwavering trust that they have in Shay to close these games out. But it’s a two-way street. Shay has shown trust in his teammates. You know, moving the ball when when it’s appropriate. Think about the big shots Lou Dort hit last game. the big shot Jaylen Williams hit, you know, the game before. It’s guys like Aaron Wiggins, uh, you know, Kase Wallace. So, unwavering trust. That’s a two-way streak. That’s what you’ve seen in these last couple games for the Thunder to be able to close them out. Tim McMahon, our man in Denver for OKC against the Nuggets. Adios, amigo.

Jorge Sedano is joined by Kendrick Perkins, Marc J. Spears, Brian Windhorst and Brian Windhorst on NBA Today as they discuss the Boston Celtics’ Game 5 win over the New York Knicks. Udonis Haslem then joins the show to discuss the Minnesota Timberwolves advancing to the Western Conference Finals for the second straight season. Plus, Tim MacMahon joins to preview Game 6 between the Thunder and Nuggets.

0:00 Perk stands on Bidness
2:35 Has momentum swung to Boston?
6:12 Wolves make the WCF
9:32 Did Minne win the KAT-Randle trade?
10:53 OKC vs. Denver preview

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