2025 WEST FINALS: (1) Oklahoma City Thunder Vs. (6) Minnesota Timberwolves

DiVincenzo has really fallen off the cliff. Last year he was putting up near triple doubles. Could have been the steal of the trade. Now suckin it up. He looked terrible tonight.

 

Precisely, the Wolves had to deal with two old rosters albeit talented ones but Steph was hurt and the Lakers played no Center.

Whereas OKC Thunder came out battle tested against Denver.

 

Getting 8 points from Kenny Hustle Kenrich is dope because he hasn't played that much in the Playoffs.

Holmgren came alive after 0 points.....

 

Man, SGA got a ton of calls tonight... A few phantom fouls and a handful of "regular season" fouls that are typically not called in the playoffs. So many touch and light bump fouls that SGA initiates.

I can see why people from other teams were complaining all season. He's smart like Harden and has learned how to draw fouls. I'm just shocked they call that stuff in the playoffs.

 

Continued to be unimpressed with Holmgren, feels like the player I'd constantly be most frustrated with if I was an OKC fan.

 

Overall I'm glad to see the Wolves get blown out. Ideally we see them get swept, we gotta have Ant feel hopeless in Minny and want to force his way out.

 

https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/s/cnNALvimWN

 

Pretty big difference .....

Minny can go and take a lead of 10-16.

OKC can go and take a lead of 20-30 in the 2nd Half.

 

[Krawczynski] Chris Finch on the player frustration with SGA calls: "There was a lot of frustration out there. We talked about that before the series started. We have to be able to put that to the side and get on with a next-play mentality."

 

1. Shouldn't be a foul. SGA jumped into Gobert.
2. Conley was reaching in too much. Good call.
3. Looked like a flop.
4. Soft call. Should've been a no-call.
5. I'm okay with that call. McDaniels did bump him out of bounds.
6. Shai ran into McDaniels's foot to fall down. Ant didn't do anything. Shai shouldn't have gotten the call.
7. There was no foul there. If anything, Shai pushed off with his chicken wing elbow.
8. Good call for the loose ball foul on Ant.
9. That's a soft call. Not a foul in the playoffs.
10. Another bad call. It got overturned. Illegal screen to start by Isaiah Joe.
11. Hm, tough call. I'm kinda okay with it, though. Ant's arm is inside Shai's into his body.
12. Soft call. Looked like Shai was falling before any contact with McDaniels and McDaniels isn't allowed to cut off the lane.
13. Clear foul for McDaniels to foul out.

So to tally up, that's 5 fouls I agree with and 8 that should've been no calls. Shai does get a very good whistle in the playoffs.

 

I remember Pop ordered his players to guard Harden with their hands down on their sides. It looked really funny. But that presumably was the only way Harden couldn't get calls.

 

Pretty sickening that Oklahoma is kicking off a dynasty. Almost as bad as Golden State’s reign of terror.

Damn you, Presti!

 

I don't think he meant this as disrespect, just that their defense was chaotically unpredictable, kind of like an amateur youth team. He wasn't disrespectful at all that whole presser, he was commenting on the defense and how they were playing him more reflectively if anything.

It's sort of like when Kerr was talking about our defense and our zone and he said he tried to figure out what we were doing and then said he realized WE didn't even know what we were doing.

 

How is this a dynasty? They haven't even won anything yet.

 

Rudy Gobert on the Thunder: “They’re grabbing, fouling. We know that we’re not going to get all those calls.”

 

I guess this is why the league had hoped that either Lakers or Warriors would make the conference finals.