During the final minute or so of the Kings’ game against the Grizzlies, there were so many interesting things that happened that can be broken down, but instead of doing a different post, I decided to try something new and break everything down individually in one post. Let’s pick this thing up with 0:40 seconds left and the Kings trailing by two.
The Kings Decide To Go Quick
The Kings were down by two points with 40 seconds left. This situation forces the head coach into a tough decision. There are two options, you try to run something quick to perserve the two for one, or you take your time and run a set to try and get the best look possible. It is possible to get a good look quickly, it’s not going to come out of a “set” involving a lot of motion/cuts off the ball. In my opinion, the best bet is to try and come away with a decent look quickly, and if nothing comes of it, reset and get the best look you can.
I absolutely love what Coach Westphal does here. It’s an ISO, but not really an ISO, as he gives Tyreke Evans a screen and instructions to get to the rim as quick as he can. It isn’t the best look, but it is a makable shot. Evans misses it, but the key is the clock. As the ball comes off the rim, there are 33 seconds left, a 9 second difference with a two point deficit means that you can play straight defense and not foul.
Beno Udrih’s Foul
The good decision/playcall that Westphal made instantly gets wiped away by a bonehead play from Beno Udrih.
At first, I thought Udrih fouled intentionally, but rewatching the tape it is obvious that he gets called for a reach, and it might not even be a foul. The problem is that you have to take the situation into consideration before reaching in like that.
With 33 seconds left and a team down by two reaches in, an official could mistake that for trying to foul intentionally (that is what I believe happens here). Conley’s got the basketball cradled in his chest, you aren’t going to come away with it, so there is no reason to reach if you are Udrih. Get back, find your man and defend. Even though Conley misses the second one, that doesn’t make this less of a bad decision.
Kings’ Quick Two
At this point, the Kings are down 3 points with 30 seconds left and no timeouts after using their final one. Again, the Kings are in a tough position here. You have to decide to try and go for the quick two, foul, and extend the game or work for a three pointer and try to tie the game back up.
Depending on the situation, my opinion of the strategies change. If you have timeouts, I like to see coaches go for two, and extend the game by fouling. If you don’t have timeouts, I like to see teams go for the three. The reason being that with no timeouts, you can’t advance the ball to halfcourt, and you are wasting time bringing the ball up the court, and you might run out of chances before you can catch up (technically, that happens in this case, Evans just hit a shot from halfcourt).
Regardless of the decision to go for the quick two (which I disagree with), this is a pretty nice set. You have Udrih curling around Cousins, forcing Conley to stick with him (to defend the three), with a quick entry pass to Cousins. It looks like you are going to have more curls off of Cousins, but then he quickly attacks the rim, getting the two. Really an effective set here.
Kings Trap Before The Foul
If you are going to go for the 2 and try to extend the game by fouling, you have to decide when to foul. Again, the Kings are forced to make a decision. Either you foul right away, or you go for the steal, if nothing comes of it then you foul. I have said before that I love seeing teams trying to get the steal before the foul in halfcourt situations.
Here, O.J. Mayo gets the ball along the sideline, and instead of taking the ball to the middle of the floor, he waits to get fouled. The problem is the foul never comes and Mayo is letting the Kings use the baseline as an extra defender. Francisco Garcia brings the double and almost gets the steal. With 22.2 seconds left, the Kings still don’t have to foul right away, and they don’t.
Now at first glimpse, this just looks like Mayo was a little loose with the basketball, but if you rewatch it, you realize that Tyreke Evans makes one of the most heads-up basketball plays that we have seen this year:
There is a newish rule in the NBA (can’t remember if it was last year or two years ago) that said in the final two minutes of the game teams can inbound the ball into the backcourt. The Grizzlies take advantage of that rule here as they send Conley behind the midcourt line.
As Conley continues to head into the backcourt, O.J. Mayo flashes to the basketball. Even though Conley seems to be open in the backcourt, the ball gets inbounded to Mayo.
Now, the problem with sending a player to the backcourt is that if it gets inbounded into the frontcourt, the guy in the backcourt is now out of the play until he gets back in the frontcourt. So basically as long as Conley stays behind the halfcourt line, the ball can’t go to him (or it is a backcourt violation)
Evans’ recognizes this immediately, and realizing that he doesn’t have to worry about his man, he quickly doubles the basketball.
Conley floated a little too far away from the midcourt line, and he was unable to get back into the frontcourt in time to be an option for Mayo. The result was a steal and an easy lay-up for Evans.
The Finish
After everything that happened, you would think that it couldn’t get any crazier. It got crazier. After a missed ISO opportunity for Rudy Gay, the Grizzlies have the ball side out with 5.5 seconds left.
There is a whole lot of stuff happening here and I have a lot of thoughts on what happened. Here are my thoughts in bullet form:
- First, I love that Evans took away the pass to Rudy Gay. The Grizzlies just ran an ISO to Gay, so the Kings’ coaching staff decided to take Evans off the inbounder and use him to keep the ball out of Gay’s hand.
- The Kings force Mayo to take one of the toughest shots I’ve ever seen. I can’t believe he made that shot.
- After Mayo hit that shot, just about everyone thought there was a timeout coming. A few Grizzlies players on the court, the Grizzlies bench, some guy in a suit that wonders on the court. One problem though, the Kings didn’t have a timeout left. Credit the Grizzlies coaching staff for recognizing this and letting the guys on the court know that the ball was still live.
- Don’t know if this was intentional or not, but it was a smart play by Cousins to not inbound the ball right away. Instead of forcing the basketball to the first white jersey that he sees (which is something that we see way too often in this situation), he lets things develop, picks out the right player (Evans) and gets the ball to him.
- I know that the Grizzlies wanted to get back to make sure that there wasn’t an easy full court pass, but I think someone should have stepped up to try and deny Evans. He is obviously the guy the Kings are going to in that situation.
All things considered, this might have been the craziest finish that we have seen this year (and considering some of the stuff that we have seen this year, that isn’t easy to say), but amid all the wildness, there were some great coaching moves, smart decisions, and even not so smart decisions that ended up working for the Kings. I’d even say that you could use these final 40 seconds to show players what they should (and shouldn’t) be doing late.
