I think Houston have found the best way to score down the stretch. Lately they started to go to Scola in the low post and go from there. It seems that for now as the best option. Houston almost every time they went inside out with him got the shoot they want. They try iso KM before didn't work, they tried pick and roll with Scola not the best without Aaron, for a while they went to a pick and pop with KM and Miller. Now it seem like they going tru Scola down the stretch and it seems like is working well. Its good to see we found for now a way make plays with the game on the line.
Best way to score down the stretch should start on defense. Its much easier to score after a defensive stop than after a score.
You can say the same about offense. Is so easy to play defense when you score and make the other team play HC. But is was a problem before that even with us playing good defense, we suck at the end of game in offense giving the other team easy baskets by turning the ball over, by shooting longs 3s out the flow of the game and going the other team fast break opportunities etc. For now is god to see we found a formula to score down the stretch when the defense gets more intense.
Scola's characteristics decides that he's not suitable to play in the 4th quarter. That's why landry took over the 4th quarter before. The referees will not give a foul easily in the 4th quarter and hence Scola can be aggressive in the offensive side. Meanwhile, he is alway not good at defense. I do not even think he is good at rebounds though he has a very decent rebound stats. His behavior does no good for the team rebound cauz he does not block the opponents to get rebound but get the rebound himself directly. while his size and jump makes he lose the competition of rebound easily. Support Hill to stay on the court in the 4th quarter.
we won tonight because we got STOPS on the other end....atleast on 2-3 very important possessions we played GREAT D....
Seriously, Scola is one of the most frustrating players to watch in this team. One minute he blows a lay up, next minute he lets his man has an easy lay up on the other end. I believe I am not the only one here cringing with the anticipation of a turn over when Scola posts up someone late in the game. He needs to work on passing out of double team though he's getting better as of lately. At the end of the day, you can't question his effort.
He was very solid last night. Hopefully, he can keep it up. Teams are now respecting his post play so much that him drawing a double is pretty much automatic. We have the other pieces to do some serious capitalization on that, and there's really not a lot other teams can do about it.
Scola's offense is consistently underrated because his game is not pretty. I admit I cringe too whenever the ball is in his hand. But more often than not, he makes things happen and hits some shots that just look like lucky shots. And the fact that he sometimes misses some easy ones doesn't help the perception.
?? Have you seen Scola against the Spurs in the 4th quarter? With Brooks and MArtin out due to injury? Have you seen him against the Bulls? +23 with him on court in 37 minutes, -26 in the reamining 11 minutes, game lost by 3.... Even in this Lakers game, he had a +20... Hill, who is acclaimed as the co-hero with Battman, had a +1 if I remember right...the rebounding beast of Hill had 4 rebouds, the bad rebounder Scola had 9 rebounds..... What's your problem with Scola you guys? that's why you wanted him traded? to replace the only unbreakable guy in the roster with another injury prone player that will fit the injury pattern of the team?
My biggest issue with Scola is his defense, of course. He has the tools to be the go-to scorer down the stretch but unless you have a defensive presence in the middle then he is a liablity on defense during crunch time. Defense wins at the end of the game and he just isn't a good player on that end of the court but put him with a strong defensive five and it helps a great deal.
i've been griping at this for a while but Luis needs to demand the ball more. No Yao and no Brooks so Luis and I guess K-Mart are the only one's left as far as go-to guys to create something.
After making those stops, we also came back at the other end and scored, which was also KEY. If we cant score after making some stops, we still lose. That's kinda how the season has gone.. we get the stops when we need it, but cant score. We score but then we cant make a stop. Last night, we finally put it together and made stops and came back at the other end and scored. Hopefully they learned from that last night and wont screw it up against Memphis and Chicago.
