Derrick Rose had an impressive 4th quarter against Spain in Team USA’s final tuneup against Spain, scoring 10 of his 24 points in the fourth, with one play in particular standing out, his lay-up over Marc Gasol with the game tied at 82. While it appeared that Ricky Rubio was responsible for the bad defense on this possession, it was actually what Rubio couldn’t control that allowed for Rose to get to the rim.
Bad PNR Defense
This possession started with Derrick Rose dribbling the ball up and had Lamar Odom come from the low block to set a screen for Rose. Odom originally sets up the screen on Rose’s right.
With the screen taking place, Marc Gasol (Odom’s defender) shows really hard:
Two games in a row, the Milwaukee Bucks’ Summer League team faced similar late game defensive situations. With under a second left, the Bucks’ opponent had the ball on a sideline out of bounds play, and on both occasions the Bucks allowed their opponent to score a game-winning/game-tying bucket (This doesn’t count the basket that Rodrigue Beaubois hit from an ISO set with .7 seconds left to win the Bucks-Mavs game in overtime). Both times, it was due to a defensive blunder, and both times it cost them the game:
Bucks vs. Mavs
With 0.3 seconds left, the Bucks were holding onto a 2 point lead. Here, there is just enough time for a catch and shoot, but more than likely the opposing team would be running a play right at the rim:
As the ball gets to the trigger man, J.R. Giddens gets a staggered double screen set for him from the two Dallas Mavericks’ bigs. These screens are set so Giddens can curl around the screens and get freed up by at least one of the screens.
Ever since he was sent down to the D-League, Hasheem Thabeet became the butt of many jokes (fair or not). I thought it would be interesting to take a look at him and his game. We are going to look at two plays from the Dakota Wizards’ (Thabeet’s team) 104-102 win against the LA Defenders (A game where Thabeet put up 14 and 8 – but with 4 fouls).
I think that the Wizards have done a pretty good job of getting the ball to Thabeet where he can just catch and go up with it. Everyone knows that Thabeet is raw, so if he can get the ball right at the basket, he can use his size advantage to finish at the rim:
On this play, the Wizards are working in transition, with Thabeet getting out in front of everyone.
The Wizards’ point guard does a great job of lobbing it in to Thabeet, allowing him to use his size to make the catch and finish at the rim.
LeBron had a very solid game, as he finished with 33 points, 9 rebounds, and 6 assists (how crazy is that this is now referred to as a solid game for LeBron rather than a great game?). The big problem though was that 30 of LeBron’s points came in the first three quarters. LeBron only scored 3 points on 1-5 shooting (0-2 from three), and committed 2 turnovers.
Mike Brown is a little at fault for LeBron’s poor fourth quarter. Normally, coaches sit their starters towards the end of the third (with like 3 minutes left) and into the start of the fourth, usually getting them back in there with about 10 minutes left in the game. The reason they sit them towards the end of the third is because you can steal a few minutes rest for your guy at the quarter break. However, yesterday Mike Brown played the entire third quarter, and he then sat for the first 4 minutes in the fourth quarter, leaving him with only 8 minutes to work with.
LeBron actually entered the game with the Cavs leading by 2. So I guess you can say that Mike Brown was justified in sitting LeBron for that long, and in a certain sense, that is right. However, the longer LeBron sat, the longer it would take for LeBron to get into the flow of the game, and that is the issue here. You can’t have your best player in a funk, during the most important part of the game (the fourth quarter).
Remember that play at the end of the All-Star game where Stan Van Gundy tried to get LeBron James an open jumper at the top of the key? Of course you do. Well, as last night’s game went to it’s final possession, I was really interested to see how George Karl was going to defend it, since he was the coach of the Western Conference All-Star team, and last night was actually Karl’s second straight game where he had to defend LeBron late:
As the Cavs lined up, the play looked really familiar. As a matter of fact, the play started the same was as the one from this past Sunday.
I don’t like tooting my horn (that’s a lie), but when I said the Cavs like to run this play late, little did I know that they were going to run it during their next game…against the same coach. So back to last night:
After Chris Bosh’s jumper extending the Raptors’ lead to 5 with 0:37 left, I thought that the Grizzlies were out of it. However, they way they played the final 37 seconds was very smart, and that is what allowed them to comeback, get the game into overtime, and win the game in OT. Let’s look at the three elements that allowed them to tie the game in the final 37 seconds.
The Quick Three
The Grizzlies come out of a timeout down by 5. Now they have two options they can either go for the 2 or go for the 3. The key though is that they need to get a shot at the rim quickly (we will get to that in a minute). Mayo sets the downscreen for Zach Randolph in attempt to free him up at the top of the key.
The Lakers have now played 4 games without Kobe Bryant, and last night’s game was the first close one out of those 4. The Warriors tied the game at 89 with 4:37 left. The Lakers then went out on a 7 point run, effectively putting the Warriors out of reach. After Ron Artest made a foul shot, the Lakers went inside to Pau Gasol. In fact, he went on to score the next 6 points. The Warriors really had no answer (they tried using Ronny Turiaf) to defend Gasol, so the Lakers went to him time and time again:
Lamar Odom pulls down a rebound and brings it up court. This is a pretty common sight if you are a Lakers’ fan. Odom is a terrific rebounder, but he also has the ball handling ability to bring the ball up the court as well.
With the All-Star game tied, the Eastern All-Stars had the ball on the side and Stan Van Gundy drew up a play. The play was designed to get LeBron the ball and let him work out of an ISO set. To the disappointment of the East (and to the 108,000 in attendance) the play was well defended and LeBron wasn’t able to get his buzzer beater attempt off:
The play is designed for LeBron to come up the middle and off of a Dwight Howard screen. As this happens, Dywane Wade and Paul Pierce switch. The purpose of this is to prevent their defenders from helping on LeBron’s drive after he makes the catch.
When you have two of the best coaches in the history of the NBA going up against each other, you know there is going to be some good Xs and Os stuff to look at. Turns out, they didn’t disappoint.
Spurs’ Pick & Roll
I know what you are thinking. A pick and roll? How is that good play calling? Well, let’s take a closer look to see how good it is:
Tony Parker gets the pick, not from Tim Duncan, but from Antonio McDyess. Tim Duncan, as you can see is setting up on the low block. The purpose of this play is to isolate Duncan’s defender, Pau Gasol.
Yeah, the title was an excuse just to post that video. Anyway, after Nazr Mohammed’s bucket with 1:38 left cut the lead to 1, the Bobcats were looking to get a stop to get a chance to win the game:
