To start the fourth quarter, Dwight Howard and the Orlando Magic turned the basketball over on two straight possessions. Both of these turnovers were due to three second violations on Dwight Howard. While the turnovers are chalked up to Howard, these three second violations were more the fault of his teammates than his fault. Both times Howard had deep post position and his teammates didn’t pass him the basketball:
The Magic’s first possession is a set play to try and get Dwight Howard the ball in the post after a dive. Howard sets a ball screen and then dives to the paint, looking to get strong post position. This happens as Arenas kicks the basketball out to Ryan Anderson. Howard is in the paint right under the basket, but Anderson doesn’t even look at Howard to make the entry pass. The ball finally gets entered into Howard, but it is one pass too late, and by the time he gets the ball in the paint the whistle blows for three seconds.
Going into their series against the Orlano Magic, a lot was made of Jason Collins and his ability to stop Dwight Howard one-on-one. That didn’t happen in game 1, as Dwight Howard scored 46 points on 23 shot attempts (16-23 from the field 14-22 from the FT line). Despite the big numbers, this is exactly what the Hawks wanted as they were determined not to allow kick-out passes from the post. The Hawks were so determined to prevent these kick-outs to outside shooters, that on 22 post up opportunities for Howard, the Hawks only committed an extra defender twice according to Synergy Sports Technology. This didn’t mean that the Hawks didn’t have guys digging down on Dwight, but they would only do so partially and when it looked like Dwight was committed to his post move:
Here, Dwight Howard makes the catch on the block, and there is no help initially as the Hawks stick with their men on the outside. However, once Howard commits to his post move, you see Hawks’ defenders digging in. These defenders are digging in only after you see Howard commit to his move because that means he can’t kick the basketball out to a three point shooter. Sure, this means the defender digging in probably won’t get their hands on the ball, but they are willing to live with that. In this case, the result is a make, but that doesn’t matter since the only goal is to prevent a kick out pass.
The Philadelphia 76ers had a fantastic start to their series against the Miami Heat. At the end of the first quarter, the Sixers had a 12 point lead after scoring 31 points. After giving up another basket to the Sixers at the start of the second quarter, the Miami Heat decided to throw a zone at Philadelphia. In the next six possessions, all of which involved the Heat playing a zone, the Sixers scored just three points. This shouldn’t be a surprise considering the Sixers have one of the worst offenses against the zone, shooting just 37.2%. The reason why the Sixers struggle is because they don’t make the correct decisions:
The good thing for the Sixers is that they quickly identify the zone and get into their zone offense (this doesn’t happen most of the time). In fact, they do a good job of getting the ball in the middle of the court by screening the top of the zone. However, once Turner gets the ball to the middle, he makes the wrong decision:
With the Dallas Mavericks leading by one point late in the 4th quarter, Dirk Nowitzki was starting to take over. The Mavericks were able to use the threat of Nowitzki getting the basketball in position to score to get Dirk an even better look.
The play starts with Jason Kidd bringing the basketball down the court along the sideline. Once Kidd gets the ball to the wing, Nowitzki sets up at the top of the key to set a ballscreen.
