NBA Finals Thread - Celtics vs Mavericks | Page 8 | The Boneyard

NBA Finals Thread - Celtics vs Mavericks

What happened to Dallas tonight was what I thought would happen to them against Minnesota. As good as Luka and Kyrie are (obviously Kyrie sucked tonight), it's tough to make hay against an elite defense when you really only have two guys who can create. Luka seemed worn down from the relentless ball pressure by the time they got to the fourth quarter.

Kyrie will be better and the defense should start to look more like itself as it adjusts to how explosive Boston is. What does worry me if I'm a Mavs fan, though, is the supporting cast. Guys 3-8 did not look like they belonged on a finals' floor, and worse yet, Kidd doesn't appear to be any closer to settling on a rotation now than he was before the playoffs. Gafford's been a rock for them but he basically got played off the floor by the end of the first quarter. Lively looked like a 19-year-old. Kleber and Jones are in theory capable 3 and D guys, but as the Celtics have shown us, there's a big difference between being a 3 and D vs. being able to spread the court with five guys who can shoot and put it on the floor.
 
champs99and04 said:
What happened to Dallas tonight was what I thought would happen to them against Minnesota. As good as Luka and Kyrie are (obviously Kyrie sucked tonight), it's tough to make hay against an elite defense when you really only have two guys who can create. Luka seemed worn down from the relentless ball pressure by the time they got to the fourth quarter.

Kyrie will be better and the defense should start to look more like itself as it adjusts to how explosive Boston is. What does worry me if I'm a Mavs fan, though, is the supporting cast. Guys 3-8 did not look like they belonged on a finals' floor, and worse yet, Kidd doesn't appear to be any closer to settling on a rotation now than he was before the playoffs. Gafford's been a rock for them but he basically got played off the floor by the end of the first quarter. Lively looked like a 19-year-old. Kleber and Jones are in theory capable 3 and D guys, but as the Celtics have shown us, there's a big difference between being a 3 and D vs. being able to spread the court with five guys who can shoot and put it on the floor.
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The reality is that of the ten best players on these teams Boston probably has 7 of them.
 
champs99and04 said:
What happened to Dallas tonight was what I thought would happen to them against Minnesota. As good as Luka and Kyrie are (obviously Kyrie sucked tonight), it's tough to make hay against an elite defense when you really only have two guys who can create. Luka seemed worn down from the relentless ball pressure by the time they got to the fourth quarter.

Kyrie will be better and the defense should start to look more like itself as it adjusts to how explosive Boston is. What does worry me if I'm a Mavs fan, though, is the supporting cast. Guys 3-8 did not look like they belonged on a finals' floor, and worse yet, Kidd doesn't appear to be any closer to settling on a rotation now than he was before the playoffs. Gafford's been a rock for them but he basically got played off the floor by the end of the first quarter. Lively looked like a 19-year-old. Kleber and Jones are in theory capable 3 and D guys, but as the Celtics have shown us, there's a big difference between being a 3 and D vs. being able to spread the court with five guys who can shoot and put it on the floor.
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Doncic only had 1 assist tonight and the entire team only had 9. Sounds like what UConn did to teams this past season. Mavs are not winning this series playing like that.
 
HuskyHawk said:
The reality is that of the ten best players on these teams Boston probably has 7 of them.
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Yup, and it may simply be about Boston's 3-7 being that good as opposed to Dallas' being limited. Gafford, Lively, Jones, and Washington were all playing their roles at a high level coming into tonight, but the Celtics are forcing them out of their comfort zone. The only things I questioned about the Celts coming into the season were whether Porzingis could stay healthy and whether Jrue would continue to play at a high level at 34. Given that the answer to both appears to be yes, the Jrue-White-Jaylen-Tatum-Porzingis lineup has to be on a very short list of best five man units in the last couple decades. Very, very rare to put five guys out there at once who are all plus players on both sides of the floor.
HooperScooper said:
Doncic only had 1 assist tonight and the entire team only had 9. Sounds like what UConn did to teams this past season. Mavs are not winning this series playing like that.
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A lot of one on one. That can work in spurts when you have Luka and Kyrie, but very hard to sustain over 48 minutes. It's only one game but Kidd and co. really need to spend the next two days working more off-ball movement into the offense. Boston's perimeter defenders are so good that they'll turn you over if you can't alleviate that ball pressure with screens.
 
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LoL. I told you all C's in 5. Porzingis changes so much on both ends of the floor. C's have too many weapons for that overrated Dallas defense. Tatum played lousy and Luka shot well, and yet we still have a blowout.
 
Really pleased with how well everyone in the Celtics rotation held up defensively. If you can play both Hauser & Pritchard 10 minutes each, makes it so much easier to have the best lineup fresh for the 4th.

3 more to go.
 
Matrim55 said:
Really pleased with how well everyone in the Celtics rotation held up defensively. If you can play both Hauser & Pritchard 10 minutes each, makes it so much easier to have the best lineup fresh for the 4th.

3 more to go.
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Hauser actually making a couple of shots is a very welcome development. Lost in all the talk about the close wins vs Indiana is the fact that the best shooter on the team was ice cold. If he's close to normal all those games are more comfortable.
 
With Porzingis on the floor, the Celtics are just a much better team than the Mavericks on both ends. I thought a sweep was possible with Porzingis healthy, and nothing has changed my opinion. The Celtics have 3 or 4 (depending on whether you think Holiday is still in this group) of the best 50 players in the NBA right now, and the Mavericks have 1. Porzingis played 21 minutes, all when the game was still competitive, and the Celtics looked unstoppable with him on the court.

The Celtics became the prohibitive favorite to win it all when they got Porzingis and Holiday, and nothing has changed. There are maybe 5 teams (Bucks, 76ers, Clippers, Nuggets and Timberwolves) that would have a reasonable chance of beating the Celtics if both teams were healthy, and the Celtics didn't have to play any of them this postseason, in a large part because key players on those teams couldn't stay healthy. The Mavericks are a decent team that had a decent season, and are outmatched unless someone gets hurt or the Celtics epically choke.
 
Because of Porzingis' injury issues and load management, he will never have monster stats, and he has played on mostly bad teams until now so he doesn't have the playoff heroics, but he is one of the best centers of the last 10 years. Jokic and Embiid are definitely better than Porzingis. I would probably take Adebayo or Sabonis before Porzingis for a season because of durability, but if I had to pick one player for a 7 game series, I am taking Porzingis over either of them.

Brad Stevens deserves all the credit for stealing this guy from Washington.
 
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The roll players for the Mav’s must step up. However their big two must play much better. 18-45, 4-17 from three and 3 assist. Can ‘t win with those numbers.
 
mcs333 said:
The roll players for the Mav’s must step up. However their big two must play much better. 18-45, 4-17 from three and 3 assist. Can ‘t win with those numbers.
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The way the Celtics guarded had a lot to do with both Luka & Kyrie's numbers as well as the role players. Luka only had 6 potential assists last night because the Cs did such a great job of defending all five guys without helping off of shooters. I believe they said that was fewest potential assists in his career in any game in which he'd played 35+ minutes.
 
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The scary thing is that the Celtics should've blown out the Mavs by even more. They had so many wide open looks and offensive rebounds.

The big change was that the Mavs, at least in this game, did not put up nearly the defensive pressure that the Pacers did. The Pacers, by comparison, hounded the Celtics.

When Boston is scoring, the Celtics defense can get set, which they had a tough time doing against Indy's offense.
 
aceboon said:
crazy that he can still switch out like this at his age

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Horford is a freak, not just because of his age, but he has logged a ton of minutes during his career, and can still play at this level. He is 3+ Standard Deviations above the mean NBA player in terms of durability.
 
aceboon said:
crazy that he can still switch out like this at his age

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What’s crazy is that very few bigs have ever been able to guard on the perimeter like he does. You almost never see anybody get by him and if they do he can turn and block them from behind. That he’s still doing it at this age is wild. Really would love for him to get a ring.
 
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HuskyWarrior611 said:
Is he wrong though? :rolleyes:

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Well, Tatum averages more points, rebounds, assists, and blocks, with a better a/to ratio, better 3fg%, FT%, eFG%, TS%, better PER, better box +/-, a higher VORP, a better RAPM and better EPM while playing more minutes, facing more double teams, having better on/off numbers and appearing more often in Boston's best lineups (net rating).

Brown's really good tho.
 
Matrim55 said:
Well, Tatum averages more points, rebounds, assists, and blocks, with a better a/to ratio, better 3fg%, FT%, eFG%, TS%, better PER, better box +/-, a higher VORP, a better RAPM and better EPM while playing more minutes, facing more double teams, having better on/off numbers and appearing more often in Boston's best lineups (net rating).

Brown's really good tho.
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Kidd is just baiting him. They doubled and even tripled Tatum. Three years ago you could bait him into going ISO and taking bad shots to get his points. Not anymore. He will keep passing. He’s matured a lot as a player.

Since Kidd’s game 1 strategy backfired, my guess is that he doesn’t double Tatum quite so much and he will score more tomorrow.
 
HuskyHawk said:
Kidd is just baiting him. They doubled and even tripled Tatum. Three years ago you could bait him into going ISO and taking bad shots to get his points. Not anymore. He will keep passing. He’s matured a lot as a player.

Since Kidd’s game 1 strategy backfired, my guess is that he doesn’t double Tatum quite so much and he will score more tomorrow.
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Nice try Kidd. Don’t think that’s going to work.

www.espn.com

Brown: 'No reaction' to Kidd's assertion he's best Celtic

Mavs coach Jason Kidd said twice on Saturday that Jaylen Brown is the Celtics' best player, a take Brown and star Jayson Tatum agreed wasn't a big deal.
www.espn.com www.espn.com
 
Doncic and Kidd are going to become more and more frustrated as this series unfolds. The Mavs can’t rebound with the Celts nor can they defend with Cs. KP and AH are a nightmare for the Mavs frontline. Doncic and Irving may be superstars but the Cs have at least 5 players who are either all NBA caliber or damn close.
The Mavs are not the best in the West but the Celts are the beast of the East.
Just love Doncic’s centerfield defense where he sticks his arms out and gets out of the way. He’s capable of playing D but loves to take a lot of plays off. Can’t do that in the finals.
 
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