Any coach allowing his players to play to their strength is a good coach. Brooks did that. All his players know their role well. Brooks also have a system and his OKC is a very good defensive team. You can say luck that he got superstars on his roaster, but against, superstars do not play under a crap coach. Game 2 was a great game for Rocket, regardless what the score is. It has been a very long time since I see McHale allow the team play team basketball instead of ISO ball. If I may, the reason why OKC only won by 3 points is because of Westbrook got into foul trouble in the 1st half. He owes all our guards.
no, mchale is easily the crappier coach. at least brooks would never have Westbrooks guard a PF or play Martin at the PG position. mchale may think about it though.
How many teams have 3 rookies, all taken in the top 20 picks of the drafts they were selected in, on a position of need for the team and none of them developed properly experience to spot minutes of the bench? Is Garcia's experience and talents who you got at the trade deadline so vital that he gets regular playing time and they play Parsons 44 minutes a game instead of your developing your forwards? If we had legit vets at the position, I could buy the rookies/inexperience argument but he's had Motiejunas and Jones less time then he's had Beverly or Garcia, while all the rookie forwards have flaws, at least one of them should be prepped by this point to be able to play 5 minutes in a playoff game.
We all know the reason why Bev has more minutes is the same reason why TD had more minutes in Rockets but no way else. If Bev is anything but a pg, he would be rioted lik our pf.
Martin doesnt have the ballhandling/playmaking abilities of Harden. He made a calculated decision in the hope that ibaka wouldnt kill us on the boards, and to an extent it worked. If Lin wasnt out for the 2nd half, maybe we wouldnt have had to dig ourselves out of that hole, but we had a chance, and one play either way and we couldve walked out of OKC with homecourt.
The stretch was more than lucky. Like many people, after the OKC 15 by early Q4, I thought the game is over. While the setup are good, Rockets was really lucky that all 3s were dropping. I think it was 4 or 5 3s in that 2 minutes.
It’s easy for Brooks to let his players play their roles because they have Durant and Westbrook who are pretty much good at everything. It’s rare for one of them to shoot themselves out of game and you don’t see Brooks makes adjustment of the offense when Westbrook goes bricking mode. Durant doesn’t demand to run the offense and Westbrook has clearly better PG ability than others on the team. On the other hand, Rockets have Harden and Lin’s ball handling is not superior than Harden’s. If Brooks were our coach I have no doubt he would try to run the offense through Harden or even Parsons. Our PF and C are horrible offensively. Ibaka always had a field day defending against us. It’s not because Brooks is some genius that we couldn’t score inside. When OKC playing against other teams with superior 4 and 5, they usually just out score them. Both coaches are just not that good.
Seeing how we can give OKC an even game on the road with them fully healthy, it'll be a pretty big underachievement if we lose this series with Westbrook not playing. If we don't win this series, it will be on McHale.
Uh, I want McHale gone too, but this is really dumb. OKC is already up 2-0 and have 2 more home games and are still better than the Rockets anyway. Expecting Houston to take 4 of 5 while dealing with injuries of its own is ridiculous considering most had OKC in 5 when the series started: a 1 seed against an 8 seed.
The "but OKC is already up 2-0 and we have to win 4/5" logic is misleading when you consider that all OKC did was what they were supposed to do -- win their home games. If we do the same it's an even series. With Westbrook out this is basically a 4/5 seed matchup. We nearly beat them on the road fully healthy and us without Lin. You're underestimating what a massive blow this is for OKC. Westbrook is the ONLY player the Rockets couldn't contain because of his unstoppable speed. He's a 1-man fast break show. OKC missing that element is a huge loss. No reason why we should lose a single home game. If we can just win ONE road game, we win this series.
So it's basically a 4/5 seed matchup, but the 4 seed (being generous here) is supposed to win in 5? That makes sense to you?
Even calling it a 4/5 seed matchup is being generous. Without Westbrook, which playoff teams in the West would the Thunder still beat in a 7 game series? I would only be confident about them beating the Lakers given their own health issues.
36-10 run in the 1st quarter by the Thunder, grabs one rebound in the quarter ... Calls one timeout, adjusts from smaller ball to small ball
Iso ball was definitely working for Durant. 1 man wrecking crew in the 1st half. But then its against the zone. You had to do zone again because it worked so well the the last game. But Durant is 1-man zone buster. McHale probably stayed with that approach too long. MIGHT be difference in the game (Credit for the current 3rd quarter adjustments). But like Jeff Van Gundy said, NBA is a "1st quarter league"
