NBA Conference Finals - The Fourth Quarter Truth: Josh Hart’s Grit and KAT’s Redemption

it is tuesday, you know what time it is. Front runner podcast collective is back on the air. I am your humble host, vince, and on today's podcast we will be breaking down last night's game between the Minnesota Timberwolves and the OKC Thunder. We will also break down the game between the Indiana Pacers and the New York Knicks, who got that series back to 2-1. There's so much to get to, so much to break down, so many storylines to go over. But before we get there, let's talk about y'all, let's talk about the frpc crew, let's talk about the frpc community, let's talk about what you guys are doing in this major one.

I would like to thank all the new listeners to the podcast. It seems like we have had a influx over the last week or so. We have garnered new countries as well, which is amazing. You know what I'm saying. So I want to take time to thank all the new listeners and, by the way, if you know the model, we kind of stole it from pat mcafee a little bit be a friend, tell a friend about the podcast, the reason why it's an independent podcast. We don't put any money into advertising this podcast, so it is literally word of mouth. So every download I get is 100% earned. And I also thank every last one of you who do listen to the podcast. Thank you so much Because we do it for you and we do it twice a week, tuesday and Fridayiday. Feel good, fridays are always good. Go back and listen to those. That'll get you the vibe of what we try to do here. We we try to have a good time, but we also try to inform you also.

Let's break down a couple of the socials. Get, get with us on X. We are more active on there. There's been more live tweeting, all that sort of thing. Whatever, my handle on X is At Frontrunner PC, the producer of this show, miss Saraya. Her handle is At Rhea. At Rhea, underscore Punch FRPC. Miss serea, her handle is atrea, underscore punch frpc. You don't need to know why. That is the other thing. If you want to get with us and leave us like a email, you want a topic to be discussed or whatever case may be, or if we put something out on social media, the best responses will end up in the podcast. So grab a vine, do not be shy, come into the jungle and get off your thought processes or whatever was going on in the NBA today. We would love to hear from you. This is interactive. Be a part of the show. It is more than welcome. With that being said, you know what we got to get to. We got to get to these games, and we will start in Indiana. As we go here, josh hart is starting get getting texts, not from fans, from other players, from guys on the team. Yo you good. They asked you starting game three. He just laughed I don't care if I start, I don't care if I play 20 minutes. If we win, we win. Those are the sentiments of josh hart in game three.

This is a story about stepping back so your team can take a step forward. It's about a guy who's always there, even when he's not in the frame. Josh Hart isn't a role player, he's a rhythm, he's a culture setter and in Game 3 against the Indiana Pacers, he became the reason why the Knicks didn't crumble. So let's rewind a little bit, shall we? How did we get to this moment?

On josh hart and his heroics, I take you back to game five against the boston celtics in the second round. The knicks are getting punched hard. Josh hart's on the floor, but the celtics don't even guard him. Luke cornett is playing the middle and he owns it, sagging off off hard, shrinking the floor. You know what that means. That means there is a no fly zone in the paint and that stops our guy, jalen Brunson, from doing the dances, from doing the balletic moves that he does. That gets him open the 14 pivots, and what have you that he's able to do To get up that midi? That is so pure and so beautiful. So something had to change. The next offense already tight gets suffocated, drive driving lanes get closed down, brunson starts forcing, og cuts go nowhere and Hart is stuck in purgatory, not because he can't play but because he doesn't fit in that moment, after the game, hart pulls to Antivital's side. He probably there's probably a discussion within the grain trust or the organization and I think at that point in time maybe Tibbs and the higher ups make a decision. And you started to see it. You started to see, maybe, the changing of the guard. Right there we get down to where the Knicks are now. They're down 2-0. They're going into G Gamebridge Fieldhouse, one of the loudest arenas on the face of the planet. It's about to go nuts.

Game 3 felt like a must win for the Knicks, even if the Mavs said otherwise. First of all, if you go down 3-0, it's a wrap. Let's call it what it is. So thibodeau finally does it. He made a move. Oh my god, tom thibodeau is not against change. He shuffled the deck mitchell robertson into the starting five, josh Hart onto the bench and Tibbs Tibbs said hey, we got to go, we got to do this. When Mitch comes off the bench, he's a starter coming off the bench. When Josh comes off the bench, he's a starter coming off the bench.

And guess what? Hart still played 34 minutes. He still got crunch time, got the crunch time call. He was still on the court when the game was sealed. He finished with 8 points, 10 rebounds, 4 assists. He snagged the game icing board, drew the foul, hit both free throws like he'd done this a hundred times before. And, yes, the knicks win 106 to 100. And hart he barely looked at the scoreboard, just walked off like it was business, and business is booming.

Let's talk about what's under the hood. I love josh hart. He was a. He was a baby laker, if you remember. He was part of that like triumvirate of what, kyle kuzma. Actually it was more of a like quintet quartet. It was brandon ingram, kyle kuzma, josh Hart and Lonzo Ball, and I was really dead set against getting rid of Josh Hart and here's the reason why he gets overlooked a lot.

But the defensive rebounding that Josh Hart does ranks him in the 98th percentile in defensive rebounding. At his position he's not just grabbing boards, he's ending, ending possessions and he's just taking the life out of your team. He's in the 96 per 96 percentile in transition shot creation, meaning when he gets the ball off the glass he's taking it down himself. He is an offensive engine when it comes into transition, especially when he gets the ball off the glass. You got to watch out for him because he's trying to create easy buckets. He's trying to create quick buckets for his team so they don't have to get caught up in the minutiae of the half court offense. His war with his wins above replacement is 7.12. That's higher than some team's second option. So when you tell me about like, oh, he's this, he's that, whatever. He's not a fluke, it's not a small sample. This is who he has been this season, last season.

Anytime that josh hart is in a position when the games matter, he always comes up clutch. He doesn't beg for touches, he doesn't run is. He's in the bottom 25 percentile in isolation frequency and somehow he's still in the top 64 in ISO efficiency. I will say that again he's in the bottom 25 percent in isolation frequency and in the 64 percentile of ISO efficiency. When does it happen? How does it happen? He's very effective because once he gets the ball and he can go ahead and push the rock or whatever he's got you on skates. He's a guy who scores. When the players break down, he rotates before the screen, he boxes out and even when the shot is misses long, he doesn't just sit there and wait. He goes and attacks the ball like it was already predestined to be his.

It's not about numbers, it's about identity. It's about what can you impact the team with, and a lot of people talk about grit and whatever, and determination. I want to tell you that josh hart is six foot four, okay, six foot four, and you're grabbing 10 rebounds. And it's not the first time that you grab 10 rebounds. You've done this multiple times this season. And if you're the person who is grabbing multiple rebounds in a season like this, at six foot four, let me tell you something.

Josh hart is that man. He's that guy, and you don't remember who started? You remember who went, who won the game? This isn't josh hart. Redemption art, there's nothing to redeem. This is josh hart being what the knicks need him to be. The way the crowd pulses, the way the locker room breathes, the way the rhythm, you don't notice until it's gone. That's josh hart. And again he is six foot four, grabbing double digit rebounds. And, the most important, gotta have a game in the season for new york knicks.

Knicks just queue up game three and you see Josh Hart flying around, flying through the air, getting rebounds constantly. Does he end up in the stat sheet? A lot, yeah, but does he end up in the stat sheet for the things that you might be looking for? Maybe not, but I tell you who does appreciate it tom tibideau. Tom tibideau and jalen brunson appreciate that man being an absolute animal when it comes to rebounds and he has some sort of possession complex when it comes to that, because he really attacks the ball like yo, you are trying to steal my property. That ball is my property and I am going to get that, and I don't care if you are six, seven inches taller than me and I don't care if I'm giving up 40 to 70 pounds. It's all going in the same. My guy, I am going to end up with the rebound, I'm gonna get that ball off the glass and we are going to run back the other direction and score on you, sir, and that is josh hart in a nutshell.

So how does this game happen? How does this game even take place? Because here's the thing and we're going to get into what happened with the indiana pacers, no doubt another guy who showed up, huge carl anthony towns. Behind his right ear there's a tattoo. You fold the ear down to see it. It reads 413. It's two things at once. First, it's a verse, philippians 413. I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me. And second, it's the date April 13th 2020, the day Carl Anthony Towns lost his mother.

So game three of the Eastern Conference finals fell on may 25th 2025. Most players, it's just another sunday. It's just a sunday like, hey, we gotta go play a playoff game. Let's go get it, let's get our, let's get in the right frame of mind, let's do what we need to do right. It's not the same thing. Do what we need to do right. It's not the same thing for carl anthony towns. You know why? Because may 25th this year for carl anthony towns it was the dominican mother's day and his mother, jacqueline cruz towns she was dominican and she is gone. My mom's side of the family hit me up and told me they were watching the game with my aunts and they wanted to and I just wanted to make her proud. This is a quote from Carl Anthony Towns. After the game she used to sit right behind the bench and even when at msg she was loud, even when the garden was shaking, you could always hear her voice. I didn't have that, didn't have her that night.

But he found something else, because for three quarters, let's call it, give it a buck. For three quarters, carl anthony towns was doing like what we think carl anthony towns does right a lot of foolishness or whatever. It really wasn't foolishness. He just seemed out of place. He seemed like a, a fish out of water. He had four points, he had seven rebounds, but he also had four fouls, so he wasn't in the rhythm of the game at all. One for six from the field, no rhythm, no aggression, no sign of the all-star he's supposed to be and also what the knicks need him to be, because, keep in mind, we're down by 20. The knicks are down by 20 at this point. You're down 2-0, you're about to get swept and what happens? It felt like another time where he only played 28 minutes, where tibs benched him and the stretch where robinson cleaned up instead. This was what we were looking at. We were looking at a situation where towns might go to the bench. We might be thinking of trading towns at. This game ends a little bit differently and he then does this and here we go, we're going into it.

The fourth quarter happened and whether it was the tattoo, whether it was the scoreboard or whether it was just carl anththony Towns stepping into a moment, stepping being the man in the arena, karl-anthony Towns scored 20 points. He hit threes, he got to the line six times and he ripped also eight rebounds. So he had eight rebounds in one quarter where he had seven rebounds the entire three quarters. So he ended up. He had 8 rebounds in one quarter when he had 7 rebounds the entire 3 quarters. So he ended up with 15. But 8 rebounds In the final stanza Of that game 1-3 from the right wing Over a lazy contest.

Another trail in the break, stepping into a rhythm like a guard. Then a drive one foot off balance glass, kiss bucket. Once he hit that and one and started the finger pointing, we knew he was on fire. This is from our guy deuce mcbride. Love you, deuce. The bench exploded and then the pacers collapsed in towns. He didn't yell, he didn't point to the sky. This is his quote. It meant a lot, man. I just wanted to do what it took, what it takes to win, and I knew I had to step up.

Look this particular podcast front runner, podcast collective. If you've been with us for any amount of time whatsoever, you know that we have been on carl anthony town's neck about silly fouls 40 feet away from the basket, about just some of the silly comments you make off the floor and all those type of things. Hey, we kind of need you to be better than what you're being. We question the fouls, we question his focus and, let's be honest, we question some of the sound bites. But this version of carl anthony towns is a different man. Let's break it down for you.

His true shooting percentage in the fourth quarter was 83 percent. Lights out isolation efficiency season long 1.12 points per possession, top nine in the league. His shot making grade is an A plus. His play type versatility is in the 99th percentile because he shoot. He's coming off screens. This dude is shooting with movement. This dude can pull up, this dude can drive to the basket. There's a lot going on off cuts or clean looks. He's making hard shots in pressure, high pressure situations. And he did it in a game where the knicks were teetering, where brunson was limited, where heart was doing the dirty work. Towns became the closer.

So you want to talk growth? This is it because, old cat, he might have pouted after game two. Benching old cat might have forced like impact into the first half. He would have took wild shots like three corners early in the shot clock just to try to get his rhythm. He might have fouled out, he might have spiraled, but this cat waited. This carl anthony towns, he trusted, he kept his body ready, his mind clear and when the moment came he caught it like it was passed from the sky. That's not a stat change, that's a maturity leap. He stopped trying to be yokich light, he stopped trying to be like a unicorn, he just played like the cat, the guy that we know he could be, and that's enough.

I was one person who was very, very um skeptical when they traded for carl anthony towns to the knicks. I was like, hmm, this is a team who wanted yannis, this is a team who wanted some other things. To see them go after carl anthony towns, I don't get it. I understood the connect, the kentucky connection. I understood that part because they've been trying to get kentucky players there for a long period of time. But I was like, is this the right fit? Is this the right fit around brunson, og and anovian the boys you're losing dante di vincenzo, which is a huge part of this team. You know, whatever you think of julius randall in his physicality or lack thereof, his pouting situation that went on in new york city, or lack thereof, his pouting situation that went on in New York City but Carl Anthony Towns might be aloof enough. He might be aloof enough that this wasn't just a win, it was a memory, it was a dedication.

On Dominican Mother's Day, carl Anthony Towne Gave his mom a game, a moment and a message, and he gave us a reminder Of who he is. This is why we romanticize sports. This is why we this is why we talk about them so excessively. It's for moments like this man. You know I'm saying I get emotional talking about it. I lost my mom a couple years ago. That shit was hard, hard. I can't imagine somebody in their 20s losing their mother, you know, trying to figure it out, but our guy has grown and it was awesome to watch and it was.

You say what you want about the game. You say, hey, you know pacers, you know fail. We'll get to that momentarily. But because every now and then the ball knows, the court remembers, and for one quarter, under the lights, through the noise, someone becomes more than numbers, they become truth. And for Carl Anthony Towns, on Dominican's Mother's Day, in the fourth quarter, that man became the truth. So good on you, carl anthony towns. Great, great four quarter.

So now, how, how else did we get here? There's a lot. Let's talk about um. Let's talk about our guy j Jalen Brunson a little bit, because he did what Jalen Brunson does, but he had a terrible shooting game. He shot 6 of 18. He missed all his threes, four of them. It was the worst stretch of the night in the second quarter, but still he finished with 23 points and he still closed the game. How is this possible? Free throws, my man, free throws, and you go. Well, what are we doing with this? You know what I'm saying what are we doing with this? I'll tell you what we're doing with this Control maturity. Brunson went 10 of 10 from the line, saying what are we doing with this? I'll tell you what we're doing with this control maturity. Brunson went 10 of 10 from the line. He scored 13 of his 23 points in the second half and when it mattered he slowed everything down.

Brunson's uh basketball index profile paints the picture like this 27 points per 75 possessions. That's the top 2%. His shot quality is in the third percentile. He lives on tough shots. Why does he live on tough shots? Because he is 6 feet tall. Okay, he looks like a fire hydrant personally. But here's the best part about about our guy jalen brunson his shot making is in the 98th percentile. That means he is a tough shot maker. Tough shot makers. Hmm, what do new yorkers love more? Yeah, they love the saucy guard. But man, you give them a guard that does crazy footwork, gets in their bag, gets into that mid range. Now you have found the true essence of the Hooper, of the New York Hooper. He was like Chauncey Billets reborn low to the ground, built for playoff noise and a master at creating just enough space to survive.

Now our guy on the other end of the spectrum, tyrese Halliburton. On the other hand, he's a genius instructor. He I mean he is 100 a conductor of the orchestra. You give him a movement shooters you give, he'll find him. You give him a short roll person, he'll thread it. But in game three it. But in game three it he didn't have clean reads, it was the live dribble pressure. No clean exits for our guy. First three quarters he was sharp 20 points, 7 to 15 shooting, seven assists and he dropped a few threes. But the knicks changed the floor a little bit. Enter my guy out of west virginia, and right now we're gonna give some love to, uh, our guy huggy bear, bob huggins. We love bob huggins. You know why? Because he liked defense. I like defense.

Miles deuce mcbride entered the game and josh hart also entered the game. The switch came literally like that every screen hollywood called for. They switched it. Every gap he probed, they shrank it and with seven minutes left in the fourth, how theton didn't score again. So I will say this again the Pacers offensive engine In game three Didn't score In the last seven minutes of that game. Halliburton Needs to be a part of that offense To make it run. He can definitely orchestrate, but if he's not hitting shots he's not opening up the floor enough. For the rest, he finished the game 0.063 turnovers in the final five minutes of that game. You can't have that from the conductor of the orchestra.

A front office uh front office person told me mcbride earlier let him flatten indiana's temple, don't wait until the fourth quarter. And then tibbs adjusted okay. So now if he's in and hart's in, who's out? Hmm, your boy burns is out. Was he? Was he all hot about that? No, he was not. It wasn't man-to-man assignment, it was defense by committee. So check this out. This is what basketball in. But index said McBride ranks. He is at the 99th percentile of screen navigation. He's also in the top five of uh point of attack containment and he's elite at recovery pressure. He wasn't on halliburton.

Josh hart, the wing, built like a linebacker with a defensive back mentality and timing, jumped every lane and baited every skip pass. It didn't just disrupt Halliburton's read, it disrupted his confidence. This series now feels like a referendum on system basketball. Indiana thrives on rhythm. The Knicks thrive on ruining your rhythm. So in the fourth quarter, where it should have mattered.

But the pacers let towns believe. And before that they let brunson walk the ball up. You can't do that. You play with pace, you play with speed, you play with a lot of movement. They got them to be a little more stagnant than normal. They confuse Halliburton just a tad, and that's all it takes.

Split seconds matter when it comes to playoff games. I don't know what to tell you. It's math, it's science. Scholars for eons have been trying to figure it out. We still don't have it figured out.

So let's go back to brunson, shall we? Five fouls, five fouls. He sat most of the fourth, came back with 137 left to go. Knicks up by two. First possession Float game, good. Next possession Draws a bump Goes to the line. You know what's going to happen now. I'm going to knock down free throws. I'm going to knock these damn things down until the sun can't come up. No more, with my daddy sitting on the sideline like a proud papa. He gonna watch his son bait these free throws have all of indianapolis mad at me and have all the new york nick fans with their timbs in the sky Thinking of blue and orange skies forever. And yes, the dub came with that situation. What does this tell us? I don't know what it tells us. We have a game four tonight. Brunson's box score Didn't dazzle.

Halliburton will look To find Another way To kind of kind of construct the orchestra for game four. That's a little bit different crisper passes, we're going to get into our decision making a lot quicker, right, and we do that might have a chance to go ahead and kind of stabilize this. So to my New York Dicks fans out there are you Minnesota and you're gonna let go of the rope in game four, or are you gonna make this a series and tie this bad boy up and then we go back to new york city? Because I'm gonna tell you right now we about to get to that other game in a second and uh yeah, don't end up like minnesota. That's what I'll say to our new york knicks fans out there. And here's the other thing keep it close, keep it close and wait till the fourth quarter. Get your boy Brunson involved, but you're gonna have to utilize that bench. Deuce McBride is gonna have to play a little bit, some other guys are gonna have to play, you're gonna have to give people a blow. And Thibodeau making that that subtle change, starting M-Rob Was huge. He don't have to close the game. He don't have to play 38 minutes, but, damn it, we need a blow Every once in a while.

Pause, I know what y'all thinking out there. Y'all sick, we need a respite. Okay, we'll see how game four turns out. Pacer fans, what do you think? Where's your team right now? Is this a blip on the radar? Is pascal siakam gonna go ahead and be the number two that he needs to be? Are we gonna to hear from miles turner? Is miles turner going to have that barrage of threes that I've been waiting for? Or do og ananobi, mikhail bridges and the boys get this to two, two and then we go back to gotham? Let me know in the comments. Y'all hit me up on twitter. Y'all hit me up on my uh email. That email for you people who needed to go ahead and send your questions or send your comments is frontrunner pc at gmailcom.

Now we do need to talk about our guy spicy p, a little bit, because our guy okay, it was, uh, it was kind of interesting. What happened with him? Uh, no points in the fourth quarter. Uh, four shots missed, no free throws. What happened? What happened to pascal siakam? 17 points through three quarters, seven to ten, baseline cuts, elbow shots, nice spin on og, but in the fourth quarter zero four and he didn't attack the rim one time, he drove, he drew no fouls. So if you're indiana and you know you have tyrese, halliburton and then basically a, a, just a plethora of just great role players who are stars in their roles, you need spicy p, you need pascal siakam to be that guy for you. He needs to be that secondary engine that is going to propel this team to the to the finals. You can't just not show up in the fourth quarter, pascal. It can't be this way.

Indiana system is pretty when it's flowing, it's poetry in motion the double drags, the exit screens, the quick lifts, the touch passes. But playoff basketball sometimes doesn't care about the beauty of the game, it cares about who breaks first. And in the fourth quarter that was Siakam. He broke. And I'm not talking out of school. You can sit there and say whatever you want about your guy. Listen, I know the Pacer fans are going to be real sensitive about their dude, but when you are 0 for 4 and you don't even look at the paint aggressively at all, that's a derelict of duty on your part, my guy. That don don't have nothing to do with me. I'm just looking at what I see. What do we need? 4-quarter ISO usage, sky-high rim protection, almost none passing out of doubles C-minus grade at best. Corner threat didn't exist.

The Pacers tried to feature him in the post. The Knicks loaded up at the nail, og shaded, hart dug and Mitch Robb rotated. And Siakam, you can't do what you did in May. Just hold the ball. Ask Julius Randle about holding the ball. Ask julius randall about holding the ball against okc thunder and he'll tell you that was probably a really grave mistake he made.

Here's where it gets eerie. This isn't just about game three. Let's rewind the Pacers postseason. First round game three Milwaukee Pacers up 2-0. Come home. Siakam 3-4-11 minus, 12 plus minus. Second round game three Cleveland same scenario Pacers up 2-0, home game. See alcom. 4 of 13 disappears late.

Now we got a little pattern here. This is the third time in these playoffs that our guy is a no-show. Because indiana plays fast, they're asked to slow. When they're asked to slow down, it is like basically putting a kid on punishment. You're gonna take my what? You're gonna take my, my screen time away? Oh hell, no, I'm about to melt down right now. I gots to have my screens.

All right, so we gotta talk about what is going to change in this uh game. For what, what should we be looking for? What's the matchup? What's what is it? Well, siakam got to get to the paint. That means he has to drive the ball. That means he has to have somebody on the floor that's spacing it. That means Tyrese Halliburton needs to hit the hit the three ball. Nembhard needs to hit the three ball, and that means that Aaron Neesmith needs to. Bearon neesmith, you don't need to go crazy like you did that. One game, no, no, no, you just need to. You know, three of eight, three of eight from three is good. We're good there now.

With all that being said, what do I expect for game four? Do I expect there to be a shift, do I expect there to be a change, or whatever? It really depends on, if Tom Thibodeau sticks with some of the adjustments that he's made? Will McBride be a ball-denying ninja? Will Mitch Rogg be part of the cleanup crew? Will Josh Hart be a chaos agent with rebound control? Will Mikkel Grigis switch and slide and be a specialist on defense? And will og and no be be an elite low man defender? These are a lot of questions that need to be answered, and the only way to get these question answer is to get to game four. But there's a lot of toughness in the knicks. These two teams are both young. They're both, uh, incredibly, uh kind of new to this situation as far as certain.

So how this is handled in game four will leave us a lot of clues to what is going to happen throughout this rest of this eastern conference finals. But game four is pivotal for a lot of reasons. I think I am going to go ahead and pick our people from the heartland of america. The heartland of america is where I gotta go, because the knicks aren't perfect, you know. They're just not. I think we got some issues that we need to clean up. Who's going to outlast who? I think Indiana can get on in game four in game bridge field house. We will see.

Now we have, uh, another reason to celebrate, because we need to talk a little bit about what happened in the game in regards to the okc thunder and, uh, the minnesota timberwolves, the OKC Thunder and the Minnesota Timberwolves. I can't believe this game at all. I mean, it was wild to me. You want to know who won game four. It wasn't the team with the best start. It wasn't the. It was the team who kept getting a try, another try, another try and then even another try. Minnesota came in with star power, momentum and with expectation. They left chasing shadows. Game four wasn't about the first option. It was about who stayed alive. And what I mean by that is this this was embarrassing. This was a referendum on all the bigs that the minnesota timberwolves have.

Okc had 15 offensive rebounds. 15 offensive rebounds oh, here's the best part. They were outscored 23 to 9 in second chance points. That is not just a number, that's a possession tax that minnesota kept paying. So, as much as you hit the three ball, as much offensive firepower you have, if you don't take care of the basketball, if you don't look at possessions as something that needs to be procured and curated and protected, we're gonna have a real problem. And guess what? Now we're down 3-1.

This wasn't just hustle boards there. These were sequence reloads, chat resets off high switches. Jalen crashes on long rebounds, kenrich rotates early and gets under the rim without disrupting flow. Here's a note from serea. She says okc's offensive rebounding rates ranks seventh in the league, but they're scoring efficiency off second chances is top three. That's their philosophy. It's like if we get a second chance, we need to make the best of it.

One of the best examples is with two minutes and two minutes four seconds in the third quarter. Shea misses a mid-range, caruso taps it, swing pass, swing pass and jaylen williams drills a three. That's the second effort turning into second execution. That's what the playoff teams live on and that's what the soft teams die on. You get, you get dealt with if you don't rebound. Ask the lakers, my favorite team, guess what you got out physical. Now you, you're vacationing. That's flip it.

Because minnesota didn't just lose this game, they handed it over 23 turnovers 23. Julius randall himself has six and the airwares have five, and these weren't attacking too hard turnovers. These were I didn't see the help defender turnovers lost the ball on the second dribble. Turnovers this was like lazy passes turnovers this was yeah, obviously okc is very handsy. They. They get their hands and their limbs in the passing lanes. But you've been watching this, first of all, the whole season. Second of all, you've experienced this now for three games. You would think that you would be more well adjusted to what is going on. Here's a note from Sarea. I love this note.

Minnesota's turnover rate jump to 17 point nine percent in game four, the worst mark of the postseason. Only nine of the 23 turnovers were pressure force. The rest were unforced errors. I'm gonna say that again. Not only nine of the 23 turnovers were pressure force turnovers, the rest of them were unforced errors. Great, great stat. Thank you, serea. Appreciate that. Great, great stat. Thank you, serea. Appreciate that.

There's one play that randall jab, steps twice and then literally passes it to no one, like he's seeing ghosts. That's not playoff decision making. That's not locked in. That's wrong gym energy. That's like I didn't come to play. You cannot beat OKC while treating the ball like it's a suggestion. This game wasn't about scoring outbursts. It was about what happens after the outburst fails.

Okc's system resets like a jazz band broken play, quick swing, handoff back into a set minnesota they stall, edward stands, randall isolates, gobert clogs the lane in the dunker spot all the things that we come to enjoy. Okc doesn't just play through its stars, it plays through structure. Plan A fails, we have a plan B, we also have a plan C and we're keeping it moving. Shea doesn't need to get a clean look. He needs a pocket of space and a defender with bad timing and Jalen was exactly what we wanted from him, the number two option that we thought he could be. He attacks late closeout with footwork and rhythm and it's a layered offense. There's so much to his game. I love jalen williams. He is uh one of my, one of my favorites.

Minnesota is still hoping for uh first action bailouts. Well, okc is creating second chances and minnesota needs them. To be quite honest with you and you would think, with rudy gobert, nazri, julius randall, uh, uber athletic, anthony edwards, uh, jayden mcdaniels, people like that you would think they would have the rebounding edge. You would think they would be the more tougher team and they have shown not to be. Now we're not gonna act like this was all grit and rebounding the hustle gives you a chance, but stars, they still are the ones who cash it in.

Serea has this shea and jalen didn't just show up. They converted all the second chance opportunities and they took control of this game and they squeezed the life out of the out of the minnesota timberwolves. That's a bar. So ray is on her game today. 74 points, 74 points on 54 shots from two guys who weren't even supposed to be co-star duo. 74 points on 54 shots. I just want to say that one more time. Just let that, let that ruminate in your dome piece for a second. That's efficient, that's efficient as hell.

Now we're gonna step into, uh, this two-man game that just broke minnesota's defensive shelf, sga, the tempo killer, jalen the ghost in the system, and you know this is frpc, so we need to get into it. What happens when you have two point guards and neither are small? Well, let's get to it all right. Two coin guards and neither Are small? Well, let's get to it Alright.

You talk about OKC winning Second chance wars. Let's get into why those second chance Turned into buckets. It's because they got Not one, not two. They got three dudes, but they got two who can run the show. They got two, like on-ball initiators that understand about protecting possessions. Let's not give up possessions so easily. Let's protect the orange. Squeeze the orange, as my guy ron kellogg would say, and neither of them get sped up. I think that's the best beauty of them.

And uh, doris burke and yeah, it was doris burke, she made this, uh, she made this point during the game he doesn't say Gilgis Alexander, he doesn't rush, he frankly walks right into the spot that he wants to get into, which is really weird. You would think that a defender would be like, okay, we know he wants to get to the nail, or right above the nail, let's get to that spot first, or let's kind of crowd that spot with multiple bodies. So then he's just he's discouraged from doing that. And the one thing that I found in this game and it sounds so simple, it sounds so simple, but the offense for okC looked relatively easy and it looked relatively painless.

And every time you saw the Timberwolves with the basketball, it seemed like we were in a really intense car race or car sequence in a movie when you didn't know if somebody was going to fall out the car. You didn't know if they turned the corner, they were just going to crash into something. We just didn't know if somebody was going to fall out the car. You didn't know if they turned the corner, they were just going to crash into something. We just didn't know. Anthony Edwards looked like he was part of the zombie apocalypse. He looked like he was surrounded by zombies you know what I'm saying and they just wanted to eat him.

Because pause, I know what y'all thinking Stop, stop, stop yourself right now. But this dude is out here. It seemed like he was going up against eight dudes. And if you remember the old ESPN commercial with Dwayne Wade, he's it's a SportsCenter commercial and he's talking to one of the and he's talking to one of the, he's talking to one of the technical producers on the show or whatever he's like. Hey, can we add in more defenders with cgi so I can look more like a superhero? Well, you didn't have to do that. In minnesota last night it looked like they had eight dudes, they had had 16 limbs On the court and Anthony Edwards, it was suffocating For our guy. It was absolutely suffocating.

What do you say about the MVP? That hasn't been said? What do you say? Because I mean, at this point there's 40 points. Okay, 40 points, we'll talk about the efficiency in a second.

And then he was 13 of 30. He got to the line 14 times. So he was 13 30, so a little bit under 50. Okay, no, no problem, especially when you are the first person on the whiteboard and all the eyes are on you. It's like tupac said, all eyes on me. But he got to the line 14 times and that's an mvp line and he made it look like it was in slow motion. He looks like he was in a john wick movie. In slow motion. He looks like he was in a john wick movie. He's john wick. Bullets are going past him, he don't care, he's just like oh man, it's just another day. This is a walking park for me. I'm just chilling. This is what serea had to say.

He walks into the screen, he shakes the big pump, fakes the punk face, the ghost of your help defender, and then drops a floater like he's in the middle of a school drill. He's not quick, he's decisive and he plays, he, he and he makes you play his rhythm, not your own. I will say this again he's not quick, he's decisive and he makes you play his rhythm, not your own. Serea is coming with bars today, bars now. He's dictating tempo, not reacting to it. And you know what? Luke, as his shot chart, the right elbow looked like a war zone. He's just living there. And he walked people down to that spot so many times in this game. He walked them down. It was almost like they were scared to touch him.

Oh, the foul baiting. Do y'all want me to get into the foul baiting? Hold on for a second. Let me grab some coffee real quick. You know I'm saying a little swig for the working man. I like coffee. It's my only vice that I have left now.

But it's not just that he scores, it's that okc runs late, clock stuff through him and he gets clean looks. That's rare. He's basically your in case of emergency great glass option and he's also the number one option on the team. So again, I'll say it again, like Tupac said, all eyes on me. If all eyes are on you, how are you able to shut off the, the video camera? How are you able to get past All of the, the theft, anti-theft alarms? How are you supposed to get through all the laser beams that supposedly you can't see? To get to the safe that's supposed to be uncrackable, but all the jewels and all the money and all the art is missing. All of is missing, like oceans 11 or something.

This dude out here, knowing he gonna get the ball, y'all know he about to go to the mid range. You know he about to go to a floater. You know he about to step back into like a 17 foot and he kind of leans back and he shoots a ball off one foot and it's gonna go in. Everybody knows what shea gilgis alexander is going to do, but they can't stop it. They can't stop it. It's a it's a privilege to watch. Honestly, it's. It's beautiful to watch and it's a privilege to watch.

And let's talk pick and roll. It's a pick and roll ball handler. He is in the 93rd percentile in efficiency. That's not just good, that's what you build your system around. This is good. You know what I'm talking about. Now soraya has a note Plus. He manipulates coverage. He's not just reacting to drop versus switch, he baits them, he forces hedges, then he gets you in out of position and then suddenly Dort has got to lay up. Dort. We love blue Dort.

Now I get to talk about One of my favorite dudes. Okay, everybody lay out real quick. Let's talk about Jalen Williams, j-dub as we like to call him. He is the perfect Second banana. On a Contending team, he might end up getting the third banana. I know that sounds like heresy. On a contending team, he might end up getting the third banana. I know that sounds like heresy. I understand it sounds like heresy, but we're going to talk about our boy Chet too. Okay, we got to talk about our boy Chet Holmgren as well, but he's looking more like a coach. Yeah, now he's cooking sides Mains.

He's also giving you dessert points on 24 shot six of nine from three-point land and he didn't even seem to break a sweat and, by the way, his post game was epic. He looked at lisa salters and said I don't know what you want me to say. We just locked in and we needed to get this dub. We didn't play well the last game and we need to show these dudes what was up now. He kind of expounded on that in his interview with Scott Van Pelt after that.

But my man did not have a lot of words. He didn't mince a lot of words. He was basically efficient with his words, like he was efficient with his play on the court. That was so, so, so saucy. Last night my man was in a real groove and you know what I love? He's a chameleon. Need movement, shooting Cool. Need him to slash Off the weak side action. Got it. Need late clock bailout? Sure, I'm your man. I got that. Oh, we have Shea Gilgis Alexander.

We also have J-Dub and I like when a young guy takes ownership, and shay gilgis alexander actually spoke to the same thing. He said it is beautiful to watch him flourish. It's beautiful to see all the hard work and the determination in the time that he is put on in the off season come to fruition. Now you're seeing what I have been seeing he's been putting in this work. This is not an overnight situation. This is what he's been doing the whole damn time. So shouts out to being a great teammate, shouts out to j-dub, just taking the moment and grabbing it by his throat and saying you know what? It's my time. It's my time to show these people who and what I am, which is a absolute, just nightmare. Second option and if you think, think about that, that's your second option. And you got shea Gildas Alexander over here, the MVP of the NBA doing work, just doing crazy work, and we're not done. We got more weapons of destruction that we need to talk about.

So Rhea has this note on Jalen Williams. I love this. He says and the thing that separates him, he doesn't kill possessions, he moves the rock, he relocates screens, he pops. That's flow, that's offensive fuel. Yeah, he's perpetual motion. Good call, saraya. Then she says this you compare that to guys like ant or even ingram. Jalen's just lower friction. He plays with the system and not in spite of it. Good call again. The one thing that mark dagnall has created is a system where people feel empowered, they feel ownership of their role and they feel like there is freedom with inside that role. Caruso feels free, chet hongren feels free, um, even hartenstein feels free in the offense.

They come off the bench Kaysen, wallace, isaiah, joe, they just come off the bench with people who's like, okay, so next man up mentality. Okay, we come in, we move the ball, we share the sugar, we get off the ball, we relocate, we continue to move and we look for not just a good shot, we look for a great shot. Per basketball index, our guy j-dub, is in the 85th percentile for spot up efficiency. He's also in the 94th percentile in pick and roll handler usage 92 from three deep three-point talent. So if you're getting all that from your second option, not your first option, that's your second option what? What is Minnesota to do? And let's be clear these guys aren't redundant. They amplify each other.

Shea bends the defense, jalen slices into the gaps. Jalen creates advantages on cuts. Shea waits, then punishes the help with a mid-range. It's symphonic to watch exactly. They're not splitting touches, they're sequencing decisions. It's like watch how they handle the hedge coverage.

In the fourth she pulls a big out. Okay, jalen back cuts and then he kicks it out to kendrick. He's not freelancing. This is composed offense. This is this is orchestrated to levels of like, like high level thievery, precision. Okay, this is implementing a plan and sticking to that plan and then just watching a plan come together. It's so beautiful to watch, it's damn near golden state ish without the turnovers. They control the ball, they control the tempo, they do it all and they lack ego. That's what makes them a playoffs. They that's what make them a playoff contender. Scary team. They are the boogeyman of this nba playoffs. Neither one needs the ball to score, but give them the ball and you're in trouble.

We want to talk a little bit more about Shea SGA's brilliance. Here's the thing that I want you to understand about Shea Gilles' Alexander if you leave with nothing today, you will leave with this Self created shot making. Shea Gildress Alexander Is in the 100th percentile. That's the top of the top. Baby Jalen's, jalen's off ball gravity Top 10.

In the league they draw coverage in different ways. That's why it's sustainable, because you're diversifying offense. We talked about it all through the season. How many dudes do you have the do you have that can create offense, not just for themselves, but for others. How many of those do you have on the court at the same time? So, and you so.

When you watch Jalen Jock threes, these aren't standstill, these are movement. Corner threes after screen slips or fade outs, this is just elite movement. This comes after, usually, your 26, 27. That's when that type of maturity usually shows up. Jalen jalen williams is like 23, 24 years old. Serea had this, also matchup difficulty. Shea is in the 13th percentile, which means okc is protecting him defensively. Jalen, he guards the, he guards the wing, he rotates out to the weak side and then he still gets you 30. So jalen williams is a is a all second team defensive player Okay, and he's also a guy who made the all-star team this year. This is a guy who is going to be a stalwart of productivity as far as offense and defense is concerned for a very long time.

And we're just scratching the surface. Scary times in the plains of oklahoma city. And then here's the thing the whole team. They feel like they trust each other and that's really not normal for young players, because the one thing that we always talk about with franchises and it was so unusual with OKC is that when you're young.

You're trying to get to your, your, your next contract. You're trying to get to those maximum dollars that you can possibly get. Usually that comes along with scoring or hey, I made my living rebounding or whatever and I gotta win defensive player of the year. But sometimes I will, I will over rotate or whatever to get a blogger to get a rebound to pad my stats to so I can go ahead and obtain the bigger contract and get the award that will lead to the bigger contract.

You see a lot of egoless basketball with the okc thunder. You see a lot of good shots passed up for great shots. You see a lot of um screens set by people who are scoring 25 plus a game, people who making big dollars. You know what I'm saying. You seeing that, and it's beautiful to watch. Selfless basketball is beautiful to watch. It's like peanut butter and jelly. If jelly couldn't hit a step back three and Peanut Butter could break a trap. You know what I'm saying. It's just beautiful to watch and it's yummy too.

Again, I want to give these ages out Because I think this is very important. Shea Gilders, alexander is 26 years old. Jalen Williams is 23 years old. The decision making Will only sharpen over time and that, and they haven't even fully unlocked Chet Holmgren. We haven't even got to Chet. You know, the seven foot two dude who is a elite rim protector also can get out on the perimeter and guard wings at seven foot two and a seven foot nine wingspan, chet hongren, is that defensive rubik's cube that you cannot solve. So unless edwards turns into something more complete decision maker or someone in the west makes a leap, this duo is going to run the conference for a long period of time. I hate to say it to you. We need to get to this.

One other thing like yo, it's cool that okc is doing real, real big things, but uh, what happens when anthony edwards doesn't take a shot in in a whole quarter? You can tell me lou dort had a lot to do with that. You can tell me that his 16 points that Anthony Edwards scored, that he was in the torture chamber. I honestly did not know that was a real thing, but I've been told by my Oklahoma City folks, my Thunder Up family, that's a real thing. On the planes they do call it the torture chamber. Alright, I'm good with that. I had to ask the the question on twitter last night, but we got that answer.

Let me say this up front this wasn't about stardom, this was about orchestration in oklahoma city's two players who could run the entire damn concert. One, shay gilgis alexander, is the slowest fast player you've ever seen in your whole entire life. The other, jalen Williams, is quietly becoming the most scalable shot maker in the western conference. So Shea drops 40, gets to the line 14 times post 10 assists, gets to the line 14 times post 10 assists. None, none of it looks explosive, it just looks beautiful. But then you sit there and you go, oh okay, what else? What else is going on? Why else did this happen? We talked about the turnovers, we talked about the rebounds, we talked about how Shea and J-Dub did their thing. What more else can we talk about when it comes to this particular team?

Well, we need to dive into the numbers because, see, the numbers tell us the story that we've been looking at it the whole year, the whole time. We knew it. We knew what was going on. Right, we knew. But when you dig into the numbers, this is what it tells us they're doing this with two different models. Okay, so, uh, the lebron impact 6.73, number one in the league, 100th percentile in isolation, transition and self-creation. That's jalen. Oh no, no, that's, I'm sorry, that's sga. Those two are sga. So 6.73. Lebron, impact number one in league, 100th percentile in isolation, transition and self-creation. Now jalen, top 10 in raptor war, 85th percentile in spot up efficiency, not just volume, and he is graded out as an a-plus in pick and roll ball handling, movement, shooting, heliocentric, and Jalen is heliocompatible. Sireah is on fire today, on frickin fire. Probably gonna have to give her a raise.

What strikes me is how composed they are, and also Scott Van Pelt said this in his post gamegame comments. He said they seem to be over themselves. They seem to not take like, be like. Yeah, I'm the man, I'm the shit, you know, I'm this, I'm that. They seem to be like okay, well, we won this game, we still got one more to win. You know what I'm saying. So you know there's really nothing to celebrate at this time. So you know there's really nothing to celebrate at this time.

Jalen Williams, who just got done, having the greatest game of his entire life in the most meaningful situation, on the biggest stage that he's been on, scores 34 points and he's in the interview with Scott Van Pelt, with Scott Van Pelt, and I mean you would have thought that he was, you know, like being brought into a courtroom and it was like, oh, I gotta be on the stand. I'm definitely like a hostile witness. I'm not giving you anything, nothing. You're not gonna have no whiteboard material. There will be nothing to put up on the willington board or whatever. I'm not gonna say anything about this team that could even be slightly incendiary. Nothing, that's a good team. We gotta play hard. We gotta continue to play hard. We gotta get better as a team. We got to be sharper. These are the things that we heard. And again the 26 and 23 respectively. 26 and 23. Respectively. And we had Again, let's get to the Chet of it all.

Chet Is our guy and he does all the dirty work, every bit of the dirty work. And this is why this team is so good, because Anthony Edwards had 16 points last night 16. This is Anthony Edwards we're talking about. This dude can score 27 with his eyes closed. He only has 16. Why is that? It's not because he's bad, but because he, even when he's average minnesota, has no way out. There's no fall back, there's no reset button and no oxygen Ant is the ignition, but when the sparks flicker, minnesota stalls out. Why is that? Who's their second option? Is there a real second option? Let's start here.

Ant is a high usage initiator, elite shot creator in pick and roll. In isolation he's in the 97th percentile in ball handler scoring talent. The problem is he uses possessions like he already had, like he's already James Harden. Without the economy of movement or the elite floor vision 23 turnover rate versus okc and 29 percentile on off ball efficiency it's not gonna get it done. Ant needs the ball to get hot, but when he's cold he becomes a possession sink and there's no system to lift him out of it. There's no secondary score to lift him out of it.

If jayden mcdaniels and julius randall aren't hitting threes, is dante divincenzo is not hitting threes spreading the floor and giving our guy the space to operate? Guess what? Their offense is dead, it's gone, there's no, we can't resuscitate it. You gotta hit your threes. You gotta make okc's defense spread out. You cannot allow them to clog the paint. If they do, they're too handsy and you're going to be stopped. The other thing, too, that we saw a lot of is we saw a lot of Julius Randall at the top of the key holding on to the damn ball. That's gotta stop. I mean that part of the offense needs to be literally eliminated. It needs to be buried. Actually it needs to be burned Then buried. That's what I would do to that part of the offense.

Soraya has this Minnesota spacing rating Via B-ball index 21st percentile, just above Charlotte. Hopefully better next year. They're asking Ant to beat switches, double drags and recover closeouts, all from a standing start. That's not offense, that's wishful thinking. Great teams give their stars multiple doors to walk through. Okc gives shea atl flares and dho pivots back, cuts two man picking rolls. Minnesota gives ant a 20 foot pull up and a good luck emoji. What's up? Hey man, good luck with that, hope you. Hope you get a good shot off again.

I told you the offense for okc looked incredibly easy last night and the offense for OKC looked incredibly easy last night and the offense for the Minnesota Timberwolves Looked like they were trying to Come up with a trigonometry answer and there were a bunch of numbers and a bunch of little X's and Y's On the chalkboard and nobody could make any heads or tails of this shit. It was difficult to play. Offense For the Minnesota Timberwolves Nobody could make any heads or tails of this shit. It was difficult to play offense For the Minnesota Timberwolves In Minnesota. I will say that again, it was difficult for Minnesota, the Timberwolves themselves, to play offense In their own damn arena. That's how suffocating the defense was.

Three empty possessions in a row, two were side sideline isos. One ended with him standing off ball while uh to kill alexander walker tried to reset. That's failure by design. Because let me tell you something, the day that anthony edwards is not touched the ball, that's a bad day. Spot up frequency for edwards 18 percentile off ball gravity doesn't exist for him right now. They need to get him off ball and then he needs to be making like decisive cuts into the lane and then start the blender for the okc thunder. I don't know if they can bring in dante divincenzo, have him run the offense and then have cat come off like flare screens or whatever the case may be, but they need to get him going downhill. They need to get him doing dhos with, maybe, rudy gobert and maybe using rudy gobert as kind of like some sort of pick and roll um experiment. And it's not just to get rudy going, it's to basically get the ball movement, ball movement, and then maybe they can lose track of ant and then that will allow it to all go well. But we will celebrate the other Canadian in this group, because Minnesota might have found something. Sometimes in losses you find lessons. And to kill.

Alexander Walker played better than Ant in long stretches last night. Listen, he's not Ant, but having another productive person that they can give the ball to and expect good things to happen, well damn, that's a great thing to have, not because he's more talented, but because he made the right reads. He kept dribbles alive, he used hesitations to shift the coverage. He found second-side shooters. He scored 23 points. He had six assists. Here's the best part he had one turnover. So, with the suffocating defense that I talked about, that happened to Ant, the suffocating defense that happened to Julius Randle, you know who was not affected Nikhil Alexander-Walker, who's also the cousin of Shea Gilgis-Alexander. So you had the MVP, shea Gilgis-Alexander, on one side and you had Nikhil Alexander-Walker on the other side.

These two grew up together banging, bodying people, taking people's souls on the court. And here they are in the Western Conference Finals, giving each other the business. He breathed life into the Minnesota Timberwolves offense. They needed him. They needed this dude to be who he was, because Julius Randle was not giving it to him and is electric, no question about it. But what happens when the athleticism isn't enough? He's still shooting 37 percent from deep, but it's feast or famine. And when his and when the defense loads two to the ball, his counter isn't to pass and re-skip, it's a pull up into a contact or turn the corner and hope. You're seeing this dude just run into danger. The bullets are coming from one direction, he's running right towards the bullets.

Great players create space, the best ones create options. Shea does it. You know, I'm saying right now ant creates attention, but attention without outlets turns into isolation and isolation turns in to predictable losses, predictable turnovers, predictable balls out of bounds that stop the clock. That allows okc to to load their defense right back up. So what's the fix? It's not raining them in, it's not benching them in. It's not benching them. It's to build real structure around him. Give him cut options, add weak side, gravity, threats. Dante DiVincenzo, nikhil, alexander Walker, maybe less Julius Randle. And, the most important thing, make him play without the ball. Sometimes, dude, give him a break.

And Edwards cannot be the coach, the best player, the GM. He can't be the sales department of the Minnesota Timberwolves. He can't be the marketing, he can't be the pr, he can't be all these things. Take some stuff off his plate. You know what I'm saying? Run quick screens into second side action for him and, most importantly, just get him off the ball. He's a top tier talent, no doubt, but right now he might be a tier two decision maker and he might be a tier three off the ball value.

This is not. This is not just trashing anthony edwards. These are just constructive criticisms that I'm seeing throughout these games and I want the best for Anthony Edwards. I want him to reach, maximize his full potential, become the star that I know he's going to be, cause he is Nova. This dude is absolutely a super Nova star. If you are able to jump 44 inches off the damn ground and have the body control of this man and have the guile, if you are able to jump 44 inches off the damn ground and have the body control of this man and have the guile and have the want to be better, I have no doubt that the success will come for Ant. But sometimes you got to hit your head against that brick wall A couple more times to figure it out.

And it's not just all about. Ant julius randall needs to play better. You need to get more out of rudy gobert and we need to see more out of people like uh nazri. Yes, you don't have the offensive firepower that okc does, but you got some really good complimentary pieces. And if you act more like the indiana pacers and act less like you're like um I'm trying to think of a team that that has a bunch of stars on it oh well, they. They suck this year, so let's not use them. Um, yeah, you need to act A lot less like OKC Because you don't have the stars. A lot less like OKC, more like Indiana. That's your lane. The role players need to be stars In their role. They need to feel empowered and they need to feel emboldened in their role and have some freedom. We're not seeing that from minnesota.

Game four showed us everything. He doesn't have enough tools around him and when he struggles the offense, they don't have a counter punch to punch back against the thunder. You don't win with talent, you win with talent. That fits and let's hope that minnesota figures it out the difference before the series is over and their silence until next year. So margins we talk about margins all the time. We talk about margins in the playoffs and how, how it gets it done right.

You ever watch a game and you know you know it wasn't just about the stars. You know it wasn't about the box score kings. You know it wasn't about your lead, all league guards, it was about just like role players and stuff like that. Kendrick Williams and Nikhil Alexander Walker were like the epitome of what that was. Now we're going to start with Kenny Hustle. He only played 12 minutes but it was brilliant. He finished with five points, 2 boards and 1 assist. Nothing sexy, nothing viral, but he was a plus 5. In a 1 possession win. Okay, that little respite I'm not saying was the catalyst to the win, but those are the type of things I'm talking about.

This is the things that OKC has that Minnesota must develop, because he knows where to be, he doesn't try to get outside himself, he cuts off the short corner, rotates on help when Edwards drives, he hits timely pull-ups, just Just one. But he became when OKC couldn't find a clean look. And Kendrick Williams is OKC's like break glass in case of emergency. You know he is top three in lineup box plus minus consistency across all five man combos Kendrick Williams, who don't play a lot. He guards twos, he guards threes and he guards fours. He screens off ball, sprints into corner space and when Jalen or SGA create a crack, kendrick slips through it. And here's the thing Dagnall trusts him. You only give a guy 12 playoff minutes and when you know he'll make all 12 count, it must be a secure feeling for Mark Dagnall.

Now. Nah, he had the game. It was like we talked about 23 points. They needed every last one of them because Randall looked lost. Again. Nah said, let me cook. He had five threes and again he had a. He had a six to one uh assist to turnover ratio last night as well. So value valuing the basketball is key. And if randall is not gonna value the basketball, you can't play my guy. Because this is the playoffs, all that like at the top of the key dribbling, I'm gonna back you down. I'm gonna be slow, deliberate, all these things. You can't do that against okc. You know why? Because the swarm is coming, and when the swarm comes I saw it last night there was like one time where julius is underneath the basket, there's three okc players around him. Now it actually worked out in a positive nature for him in that, in that aspect. That particular time where he ended up with a foul went to the line, but for the most part it was turnover, deflection, ball out of bounds it was. It was mostly bad outcomes in the second quarter.

He comes off a high screen, pauses just enough to freeze Caruso. Then cat in the pocket. Uh, yeah, then cat in the pocket. This is, this is Julius Randle, right, so Julius Randle is sitting there. He's just sitting there watching the wall or watching the defense load up. He's looking at Rudy Gobert in the dunker spot. He's got Nas Reed on the floor. Sorry, it was a cat, it was Nas Reed. Dark skinned brother, light skinned brother. One really did his thing, the other one did not.

He comes off high screen. That's an NBA level, reed, whatever. But he holds on to the ball, doesn't get it to where it needs to go. It's not moving. It's not moving. Ball finds energy. You need to do that. If you're not doing that, guess what's gonna happen. Steel strip ball to ground. Everybody's covered. Here we go again. They need to get on top of this and they're three one. So this is almost over. Almost over because we're going to talk about the things that, um, this is not. This is not marvel cin cinematic universe, but we're going to talk about the invisible possessions for a second. The playoffs aren't about explosions, they're about accumulations.

Here's one sequence that I can't stop thinking about SGA misses a floater, caruso taps it out, jalen relocates, kicks it to Kendricks William in the corner, miss Kaysen Wallace rebounds the ball, resets it to SGA who then hits a mid-range dagger. So you got like three possessions off that situation. You got one shot, four touches, three reads, one kill and minnesota. They don't have that. They lose track of guys. They check out when the first covers breaks, they don't win time. You know, I'm saying there it's, it's got to get better.

Now let's talk about okay, sees bench a little bit. Let's talk about the other guys Kendrick's, caruso and case and Wallace optionality. You got different body types. You got dudes who are just dogs on defense, because case and wallace played his absolute butt off. He played his whole face off. So rea says the best. These aren't backups, they're connectors. Sees it's every, every time. Now Just bars, okc's case. It's not a system, it's just like we got hockey lines coming out at you. They can close with Case and Wallace. Kendrick Williams again is trusted and Caruso has just solidified what the defense is supposed to be. So, with that being said, you have to remember this.

Let's talk about game five for a second. It's not about sga dropping 40. It's not about who rotates when he gets trapped. It's about who drives. Who dies for the loose ball. For the loose ball. Who is about to remember the coverage at minute 42? Because the postseason the stars are the doors but the margins are the hinges. Every star needs scaffolding.

Okc is built to laugh Because they got a ton of it, because these dudes Play hard, they value the basketball, they hit open shots and they play defense. Super weird To see everybody On a string. So one accord. Beautiful to watch, very interesting, interesting how they have cultivated that. So what actually swings game five? How can minnesota keep themselves in it? Because it isn't about.

So what's going to happen is this let's start with okc. They already know that they are in the driver's seat. Keep scanning. Multi-handler pick and rolls. Sga, jay Lee Williams action. Destroy Gobert and Randall in space. Invert the floor with Chet as a corner spacer early. Then bring him in to a pick and pop action. Late Blitz Edwards on the catch. It worked to perfection.

When he has lack of airspace. Sometimes he gets a little loose with the ball. His decision making, I would say, goes down by about 12 and that's what we get. And now here is a stat that you must hear. So raya has this one, I gotta give her credit. Okay, lkc scores plus 1.27 points per possession. When chet pops above the break after screening for SGA, stretch him out and then slip him in. Okay. So when he is above the break, so we're talking at the top of the key and he runs a pick and roll for SGA, and then he kind of flares out to the three point line, again plus 1.27 points per possession. And that is not a small sample size, folks, it is not. Now.

For the wolves this is harder because they just don't need tweaks, they need to rethink. I think you need to reduce randall's usage. Uh, one field goal in game, four, five turnovers. Stop trying to run sets through him through just an unproductive brick wall. Maybe let uh nikhil, alexander walker or dante diVincenzo initiate more second side action. These are the only two guards that can beat OKC. Nail pressure and use Ant maybe as a screener early. Get him into space and not from space, and then maybe flatten Govera's roll if he's not rolling hard and sealing, he's just in the way, so he's not bringing the impact that he needs to bring.

It might need to be a naz reed game, because at least with naz reed you get the, the threat of three point capability. Obviously with rudy go there you don't have that at all, and right now we need to win a game. You know all hands on deck, it's time to go get this. And you're going back to okc. So good luck.

And if you're, minnesota, run some damn sets, run some horn, flex some stagger screen continuity give and a read, not just the burden of creating offense out of ether, out of thin air, because you're not going to be okay. See, you're not going to out talent them because you don't have enough talent to out talent them. You need to get your ass on the glass, you need to eat rebounds, you need to get second chances, you need to create turnovers. The turnover disparity between these two teams cannot be 12 13 and you're in the negative on that situation, minnesota. It just cannot happen.

We have given you both, both just extended just love between these two great series, and I want to thank um saraya for her help today. Uh, providing a lot of the, the little messaging and also the stats and everything. Uh, our team is incredible. Thank you to everybody um in the frpc crew. Appreciate y'all.

And this the best part of you is you right, make sure that the people that you are surrounding yourself are exhibiting uh supportive behaviors. You know uh they're, you know, lifting you up. They are uh encouraging you, um to to make wise choices and uh inspiring you to to to lift yourself higher than you thought you could possibly be. And if you got friends like that, if you got people in your life like that, make sure you acknowledge them, make sure that you really give them the praise that they deserve and also call them up, give them a hug, facetime them, do what you need to do, you know. Let them know at the time, because when the time runs out, you'll be asking yourself I wish I had more time with them.

Don't be that, don't be in that situation. Give the praise at the time. Don't wait, don't hesitate, don't be like the minnesota timberwolves when they get the ball at the top of the key and they see the okc defense load up. No, no, be decisive. Make that call, say hey, I was just thinking about you and I just wanted to tell you how much I appreciate your friendship or, you know, brotherhood or sisterhood or whatever it is. Do that now. You're doing all that and you got those type of people in your life, then guess what? You're a well-grounded individual and you are the type of player that we want on our team, on FRPC's team.

So be a friend, tell a friend about the podcast. Be a friend, tell a friend about the website, which is frpcpodcastpageio. Now, once you've done that, on the top right hand corner there's three little lines. Click that boom little drop down menu comes down. You know, I'm saying we got a real crack-a-lacking over here. You will go to the blog section. In that blog section you should see a blog that corresponds with this podcast, because we try to give you a second screen experience to go along with your listening, uh, enjoyment. So you have visual enjoyment and listening enjoyment and we provide it all for you Because that's what FRPC does. So, for Soraya and the rest of the FRPC crew, I am Vent and we will see you on a feel good Friday Deuces. Thanks for watching, guys.