The Timberwolves Just Made A Statement…

The Timberwolves Just Made A Statement…

Let’s talk about these NBA games. We got the Jaden McDaniels game three. We got the Bucks keeping their season alive and the Orlando Magic holding the Boston Celtics to what 11 points in the fourth quarter. We going to talk about all of that, but we did get in game number three, the JD McDaniels game. You know, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the two games that the Wolves have won in the series are games where JD McDaniels had a really good offensive performance. In real time, you never really notice this, but between February 1st and February 28th, this is the time where Julius Randle played zero games. He was out with his injury. And during that time, we saw Jaden McDaniels take a step up offensively. Hell, I dropped a video during this time like, “Hey, is anybody watching what JD McDaniels is doing right now?” Because throughout the first couple years of his career, he had turned himself to a three and D wing, which is great. You get paid being a 3 and D wing, but he had to remind himself and remind the world that that’s just not who I am. I know that’s what my role has been here, but I could do so much more. So during that stretch where we’re talking about Julius Rand being now with his injury, JD McDaniels was averaging 19 points per game. He was averaging eight and a half rebounds or three assists. That little stretch empowered him to be ready for stuff like this. Luca Dantis is there with the BGs. He’s got stomach flu. He’s got something going on. And he is the primary defender on me. Say less. We going to take advantage of that. And when they when we found out that Luga was going to be dealing with this stomach thing, I always have to ask myself, is this going to be more of a flu gang type of thing where he still turn up and he still do his thing or this going to be like a traditional I’m sick. I can’t really go to work. The last time I had the BGs or I had a stomach bug, I didn’t go to work. I me and my job is this. This not even close to playing 40 minutes in an NBA playoff game and it ended up being between the two options, a flu game or a bad game. It was a Luka Dante’s bad game. Now, he did give us a couple great moments where he hit the the wing three over Julius Randall with seconds expiring on the shot clock or he had the moment late in the fourth quarter where Chris Fence has done a pretty damn good job balancing his rotation for what is necessary, right? Um the Minnesota Timberwolves are playing good basketball. They needed a few stops. They bring in Rudy Goar and the very first play Rudy Gobear is back on the floor. Luca Dantes draws a foul and then the second play that they’re on defense, Luca Danton scored and Chris Fence is like never mind. get your ass out the game. Uh, where you at, Naz Reed? So, uh, he gave us a couple good things, but for the most part, this is a really bad Luca game. And I don’t want to turn this into a Luka Dantis Trey thing, but I know somewhere if if Nico Harrison cares to watch basketball now that he’s on vacation, he probably feels somewhat vindicated. I feel like that’s somewhat unfair, but they were going at Luka’s head this entire game. We talked about it before that for the Minnesota Timberwolves to continue to win games in the series, they got to find a way to play their brand of basketball. I thought that when they stayed in the half court, it benefited the Lakers more than benefited them. You got to think about who’s the star of these teams, right? Luka Don has been able to be malleable throughout his career, but the majority of his career, he has been the engine of a slow paced offensive team. I know when Kyrie got there with um with the Dallas Mavericks, the tempo went up more, but historically he’s a slower place pace player. LeBron James is 40 years old. He can still get on the break and everything, but he’s still 40 years old. They really benefit from being a halfcourt team. And it happened in game number two. And in game number three, I thought that the Wolves definitely took advantage of having the younger bodies and getting up and down the court. But more than anything, where they held their hat today was points in the paint. They were so aggressive getting downhill where they beat Julius Randle or Anthony Edwards. And I know we uh we started off by talking about Jaden McDaniels just 30. Anthony Edwards, another masterful performance where they were throwing two bodies. They were throwing laid help. And you question what type of performance you’re going to get from Anthony Edwards. And of the three games we got in the series, two of them he was a master in the pick and roll. He was a master making those decisions. Today his final stat line is 20 298 and eight. A couple huge huge shots down the stretch. zero um field goal or free throw attempts, which is still crazy to me considering how often he gets downhill, but only two turnovers. And those eight assists could definitely be more because there were a few times he did draw in uh two two guys, three bodies, kicked it out, and somebody missed a shot or failed to shoot a shot. Shout out to Dante Deenzo. This was an amazing game. Julius Randle gives us another really good playoff performance. Uh oh, are those monkeys getting off his back? Are we are we still going to look at Julius Rand as a playoff dropper? Again, we’re talking about one game here, but like he has been pretty damn good in this series. And again, Finch has done an amazing job balancing what is necessary in the time. In the first half, I thought Rudy Gobear did pretty damn good defensively, but god is he offensive. This is the same story we said every single game, right? He’s so so bad offensively that when you get that level of of push from Nas Reed, who who him and Dante in these last two games have been really struggling to not foul, they both ended up with four in this one, but Nas Reed hitting big time shots. We were in Discord watching in this game and my boy Pierre’s like, “Yan Reed might get the the crown of Lakers killer.” He only had 11 today, but I promise you it was allowed 11, you know. So, amazing amazing game for the Minnesota Timberwolves today. Um, low turnover, really aggressive. They ended up uh the Lakers ended up hitting four more threes in them and it didn’t matter. LeBron put on his best game of the playoffs and I’m assuming that they just all talked about, hey man, this ain’t going to be a Luca Danton game. He’s dealing with this stuff. He’s got the like everything is going on. We gonna need you to take us home, bro. And he went through that stretch. We hit like three straight threes. You’re like, “Oh, bro.” And he’s about to hit that fourth one and the ball falls out of his hands. And I think that JD McDaniels got an one layup on the other side. He did have the shot late in the game where he hit the side of the backboard from the right wing. That was tough. That’s all I can say. That was really tough. Um I know they’re going to continue to try running Jackson Hayes in this series. I just don’t know how you can. I think we’re at the point of this series where you’re going to have to see you’re going to see coaches make some huge huge adjustments on a game-to-ame basis. I think the Lakers just have to completely hone in on a small ball because even in this nine minutes that Jackson Hayes played, it was awful. It was it was really really bad on both sides of the floor. Just uh lack of spacing and they’re not looking at him as a super lob threat as he may should be and he’s not doing anything. So, I don’t know. I’m not saying you should start these games with the small ball, but maybe just get rid of even what was it? Nine minutes. Maybe that’s down to two, dog. Maybe that’s down to zero. I don’t know. I don’t know. But being up 2-1 is huge for the Wolves. They got another game at home. I think that’s on Sunday if I’m not mistaken. And I was somebody that picked the Lakers in this series. Thinking about the top end talent. I mean, the Wolves are the more complete team if you got to think about who the Lakers are. Like, this team is not built around Luca. They just happened to acquire Luca. So, maybe we were just a little bit too early or maybe not. It’s still just a one-two series. I don’t want to jump the gun too much. This is still anybody series, but in the two games that the Wolves have won, they look pretty dominant. And even in the game that they lost, they really just lost one quarter, right? That 34 to 15 quarter of game number two was the reason they lost in game number two. So you can, if you’re a Wolves fan, you’re probably feeling pretty damn good even though you’re only up to one. You can squint and say, “Hey, anything is really po. We could be up three 0 right now.” And that’s huge. That was huge. So, um, beautiful game, man. I know the final score being a 12-point game, it was down the stretch. It was really electric. Um, Austin Reeves hit some shots today, right? So, that’s good for the Lakers if you’re trying to find some silver liners because he was not hitting his three-point shot at all in the first couple games and now he hit a couple. So, it it is what it is. I’m still trying to figure out exactly how can they empower Rui Hachim and maybe they can’t. Maybe they can’t, right? But I think about them. He hit the first shot of the game if I’m not mistaken. And there were a few times where when Mike Connley was in the game, Mike Connley is guarding him and they tried to give him a little post touch and then he got some help and I think he turned the ball over on one of those plays. I just don’t know. There’s no other real options, right? It’s not like you’re going to have to bench Ru Hachimmore. But so far in the series, we haven’t got nearly as good of Rui Hachimmore performances as they need to win this series or if it’s not just this series, the next series or the next series after that. So shout out to the Wolves. Big time game. Um let’s go to the other game. The Bucks, you know, go prevent themselves from going down 3 0. If you listen to small ball kitty beat him, I was saying, man, that things are not looking good. When you have Cal Kosma on the court with Giannis and Brook Lopez, the offense and the defense is absolutely awful. And in this game, do I dare say that Doc Rivers made some adjustments? Brook Lopez barely played. Kyle Kosma barely played. I mean, 21 minutes, but he barely played. And they went in with a guy named Gary Trent Jr. Bro, if you would have told me if you would have told me that there was going to be a game this series where Gary Tren Jr. led all scores, I would have called you crazy. Now, he tied with Yiannis at 37, but that third quarter, I think he had more points in the third quarter than the entire Pacers team. Shot after shot after shot after shot. And you can call the fool’s goal if you will, if you if you want to, but at the end of the day, they just extended this series. At the end of the day, they gave themselves a chance to maybe make something happen. Bucks and six is still up up in the air. Dame had his another really bad shooting night, but I thought that Dame was pretty damn good defensively today, dare I say. And I’m not even just looking at the fact he had two blocks. One of the blocks was on Pascum. Uhhuh. But I I’m not even looking at the the stats. It’s like watching him fight in this one was pretty damn good. So, shout out um shout out to him and shout out to the Bucks. You know, they retaining overrated for Tyrese Hallebertton. I think that my my one criticism from Tyrese and I’ve said this for the last couple years of his career is that sometimes he will break down his defender get to the paint and immediately just think pass. And I know that’s who he is. It’s how he gets everybody available. Hell is how they become one of the best offenses in basketball every single year. But I at times just want him to attempt a shot at the rim. Just do it. And I think let me see if I can find these numbers right now. I remember looking at his um cleaning the glass um earlier in the season and maybe it did shift but like earlier in the season I was looking at where his shots were coming from versus the rim the mid-range and the three-point shot and his rim finishing yeah his rim attempts have dropped off significantly his first year in Indiana first full year 28% of his shots came at the rim then last year was 22 and this year it’s 14% and in the playoffs I don’t know what the number I don’t have the play oh show playoff stats 17%. So, he’s attempted four field goals at the rim so far. He’s drawn two fouls. So, let’s say six layups or a dunk. He had a dunk in this game. Um, that’s just not going to cut it. And again, through the first two games, it was working. But, there were just times in this game where the Bucks are on their run and he gets around that corner and it’s immediately looking past when he probably should have been looking shot. So, that’s it. Um, I I like I want this series to go far. So, I’m I’m I’m not rooting for anybody obviously, but like, you know, the Bucks going down on three would have been the end of the series. Let’s be real. So, them taking a game on their home court with that electric crowd. It’s pretty good. Um, they hit 15 threes as a team and nine of them came from the hands of Gary Trenton. Four of them came from the hands of AJ Green. So, it’s like it was them do them guys and that’s it. That’s it. But again, it’s the playoffs, baby. All you want to do is win. It don’t matter the the methods. in the last game and and this was one of the games where I had half of an eye on them. Um the third quarter for the Celtics was like the worst basketball I’ve ever seen. And that’s saying something because we’ve had some really bad uh playoff game playoff quarters in this but like 11 points is obviously unacceptable. It was a great Jason Tatum game. He started off um really really hot. Eventually not only did he cool off, everybody cooled off. No Drew Holiday in this one. And Drew Holiday has been pretty big in this series. We’re not like a full game, but there have been spots in this series where four minutes stretch. Drew Holiday looks like the best player on the court. They definitely could have used him today. Porzingis is like 0 for 11 from three so far in the series. Sam Hower still hasn’t scored just yet. And the Orlando Magic keep the Celtics from scoring 100 points. And if they play the the only way the Orlando Magic win this series, which is 2% chance, they got to continue to hold the Celtics to under 100. That’s the only way cuz them scoring 100h, you know, they’ve scored 100 two times in the last seven games. Smiles. Uh, gotta give a lot of credit to Paulo. Got to give a lot of credit to France. But here’s my notebook. I got to take my notes in. Let me let me go to this game again. I had this with like just I was mostly watching Pacers Bucks. I thought that’s that is the most interesting series. But here’s one of my few notes from this actual game. Um this is after France Vagner attempted that three at the end of the game and end up being a long rebound that the Celtics end up getting. I didn’t like I thought that the the refs should have put more time in the clock. 3 didn’t feel like enough considering where it was. Anyway, my thing says no way should France Vagner attempt 13 threes in a game. He hit three of them. Like, yeah, but he should not be shooting 13 threes, bro. And it’s like, I mean, I’m sure he believes he has to because KCP has been a non-factor offensively all series long. He was supposed to be your shooter. Um um um I almost called him Alec Black for whatever reason. Anthony Black is 0 for four. Um in this game, yeah, is 0 for one. He hit one, but his foot was on the line, so obviously that don’t count. So, they just need somebody to attempt threes. They were eight for 20, eight from 32 from three and 13 of those threes came from Fron. I don’t know, man. I I hate the I hate the hitch. Everybody hates the hitch, but that hitch is really nasty. And if he hits three, then you’re like, “Okay, but three of 13 is bit much.” Anyway, um enough of that. Great gay uh day of B playoff basketball. I’m just tired. So, I’m going to

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