Gotta give him and the coaching staff credit to come back down from 3 - 1. It took him to make them believe. Also, like the adjustment of forcing the Clippers to the left side of the floor (Paul, Reddick, Barnes, Crawford), where the shoot a bad percentage driving with left and trying to shoot with right hand.
I thought it was an awfully classy move to start his post game comments tonight by mentioning Sammy Day, just really classy.
I’m here to apologize for all the mean things I've said about Mchale. To get to the WCF with as many injuries as we've had this season is incredible. I've been critical of his coaching ability all season..but the results don’t lie. I WAS WRONG!
I will apologize for the critical things I said, as I said I would if this happened. He outcoached Smart Doc and Lucky Carly!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WCF... how sweet it is!
Don't worry sf3isback!!! and the usual posters will be back in here any minute now to talk about how we won "despite" having McHale, not because of him.
Absolute genius move he made in the 2nd half when they brought dauntay jones in to hack Dwight... As soon as jones fouled Dwight twice, mchale subbed out Dwight for I believe t jones and we were all the sudden in the bonus... Great move frankencoach
LOLOL. I will stand strong in my big picture position that a more disciplinarian style coach will be better for this team. That said, McHale made some huge positive decisions for the team at the end of game 6. And here in game 7, he was extremely micromanaging, which I loved. The timeout trigger was super fast (so fast that we only had a couple left when the 4th started). And he grilled Brewer while we were still up 10 iirc for switching onto Crawford and then playing him to his strong hand. The Rockets went from playing so schizo the entire playoffs to putting together 3 strong and focused games in a row (except for the 3rd quarter of game 6). If McHale is to shoulder some blame for the Rockets' lack of focus up through game 4 (which I do blame him for that), then he should get credit for his adjustments and getting them to focus well since then.
It's hard to believe how badly McHale outcoached Rivers down the stretch. The first series defining move was putting Smith in the starting lineup. Rivers never adjusted for this. It just was up to how Smith was playing. We know why this worked. More defense for the starters. More offense off the bench. The second, obviously, was the holding out Harden in Game 6. Don't mess with what's working. It's hiw I'd be as a coach as well. Harden was -21 for the game when he was sat. Defense sucked. No brainer. The third was FINALLY adjusting on the hack-a stuff. Took a near disaster before halftime of Game 6... But he finally learned his lesson. I still contend Pop hacked his team out of their rhythm in Game 6 against the Clips.... And lost that series. But to top it off, the strategy in the third was great. Not that it wasn't the obvious choice... But often coaches don't make the obvious choice. Like Doc. No clue what he was thinking. There's a quarter plus left to play. The Clips got nervously close at the end. Doc gave away points in the third because of that stupid strategy. The 4th move he made was whatever pep talk he gave to Brewer, Terry and Prig. Ariza was great too... But aside from his shot not falling as much, Ariza was effective throughout. But the other three. Geez. Night and day difference. I tell you this, if the Rockets make it to the Finals and a championship you'll have to give a TON of credit to McHale. A TON
