What's your point? Kings got 26 points in 4Q, which is normal. We got f**k 10 points only, which is b****t. .
Yeah 10 points in the last quarter is terrible. I guess my point youre asking is, I would've put landry in the game over novak, and put battier on artest. You pointed out novak's defense wasn't bad. That's your opinion and I respect that. I would've liked to see novak do more than camp for the three. I just feel that Landry coming in and disrupting the paint on the defense, and possibly getting a few key offensive boards/2nd chance opportunities on our end of the court could've lead to a safer win.
It is fine. What I am thinking is that, Rafer played very well in the first 3Q, but after the 18-19pts lead, Rafer thought it'd be a easy win, then he decided he must be the hero, he didn't play his game in 4Q. To me, Rafer is the real cancer. .
Kings played a hybrid zone. Artest played 1on1 on Tmac at both ends and obviously Tmac was owned except the last play. We didn't have another penetrator to exploit their gaps. That' why we need a guy like Bibby or Maggette who is good at putting 3s or penetration.
I didn't notice that the Kings played the Diamond and one zone. I thought it was the regular 2-3 zone but I think you're right. Artest was on T-Mac like glue.
Box and 1 is what they played or a hybrid of it....they should have put Tmac on the Wing as a decoy, Scola in to attack the FT line, and then away you go. DD
For those saying that Scola would have prevented the offensive collapse, I submit the following: http://popcornmachine.net/cgi-bin/gameflow.cgi?date=20080113&game=NORHOU http://popcornmachine.net/cgi-bin/gameflow.cgi?date=20080115&game=PHIHOU
yeah box and one is different from diamond and one. box is 4 players 2 at the low post and two at the wings. diamond and one is 1-2-1. But whatever zone it was, we got owned by it in the 4th.
What we saw yesterday was the same thing that happened against Philly and New Orleans. The offense stagnated due to pressure defense, guys became tentative, we turned it over, we wasted possession trying to get Yao the ball, lacked penetration. Maybe Scola would have helped, but considering that our last two offensive collapses in the fourth came with him on the floor doing nothing, I wouldn't assume that's the case. Oh, and if Novak isn't capable of busting that zone, why would Scola? The Rockets were tentative and indecisive with their passing. We lacked penetrators when T-Mac swung the ball out of the double team. That was our problem yesterday, and it's been our problem in the past.
I think Rafer did drive in a couple times early in the fourth actually, but he missed a layup and floater.
The 2 games you mentioned were different in some regards to last night as TMac didn't play in either of them so the defense was not exactly the same, but yes, hard nosed defense seems to rattle this time and take away our bread and butter plays. But I think that one thing Scola/Landry definitely would have brung that Bonzi/Novak did not bring is energy. Because I think that was what was most lacking in the final quarter. I also think that we would have been better served running the pick and roll with Scola instead of Yao because Scola brings more of the penetration that you are talking about. I also like Scola here as it allows Yao to become an offensive rebounder or weakside threat. Plus some of this should go on Tmac because Tmac was not nearly quick enough to get rid of the ball or attack the traps that he knew was coming. this is always what happens when we have the collapse. We run pick and rolls with Yao and TMac and they trap TMac and our offense goes south. The Rockets really need to plan better how to get by this commonly used play. Yao should share some blame here too as once again he let himself get taken out of the game by someone he should dominate. Once again here is where Scola would have been handy as he can run the double high post with Yao, which is one of the ways we have of getting past the aggressive fronting defense that teams like to throw against Yao late in the game. I guess I just don't agree with Adelman's decision to go with Novak as it magnified our problems by putting another stand still shooter on the court instead of the penetrators/slashers and activity which seems the opposite of what this team is trying to become offensively. It doesn't really matter in the end as we pulled out the win, but Adelman really needs to figure out why this team is so prone to collapses beyond blaming the mental makeup of the team.
Rafer Alston and Yao Ming also played huge roles in those 4th quarter collapses. Should we take them out of the game, too? And the defenses played were different. And highlighting 2 fourth quarter collapses ignores strong 4th quarter plays (Scola and Landry against the Blazers, other games...) I'm not saying the answer to the above is always no, nor am I saying Adelman made a mistake for not playing Scola last night. Scola was having a bad game. Rick probably was looking at the same analysis as we have and saying "let's try it without Scola tonight." But as last night showed, you can't just say look at these 2 games, let's keep so and so out, and our problems will be fixed. Scola wasn't playing and there was still the collapse. The point generally being, what DD is seeing is that Scola is one of the few guys on the team who seems to instinctively know how to attack zone offenses. For the same reason he is good to have on the floor when Yao is being fronted. Scola understands the soft spot at the FT line. He is good there, knows when to go there, and generally what to do what he gets there. All that said, he's still a rookie, and still has problems with untimely turnovers, and generally catching up to the speed of the game overall. The good news is that we won last night's game, regardless of who played in the 4th. In the long-run, though, it appears that Scola should be part of our offense when going against the zone. Theoretically, AB should be good at this too, with his ability to penetrate - but as we've seen the last month with him, he's been excessively tentative. Bonzi has shown, especially in the last month, a surprisingly good ability to make some quick passes to open players, plus his offensive rebounding capabilities, should make him a decent zone player, also. I think all of our players have some attributes that should work against the zone, but they all have negatives, too. Rotations aside, since I think a number of different ones could work, Adelman needs to preach one thing specifically when going against the zone: Speed of attack. the Rockets have a tendency in the half-court offense to be a fairly deliberate team. Man to man, this tends to work. Set up the play, run a pick and roll with solid picks. Or dump it into Yao, wait for a double team, find an open man, make the extra pass, shot, etc. Even in the half court, though, they could use a little quicker pace. But against the zone, ESPECIALLY if your outside shot isn't following, they need to play much quicker on offense. This doesn't mean force stupid passes that lead to turnovers. But it does mean that when you get the pass you need to quickly decide - shoot, drive, pass on to the next guy. Quick passing and the zone can't react quick enough, creating that open space for Scola at the free throw line, or the open space for AB to penetrate, or an open three for Shane in the corner. So, when the Rockets offense collapses, they need to focus on speed of attack. Usually, though, they do the opposite, and get even slower, making the offense even worse...
Alright, that's a good point. We flat out needed better, smarter offensive players on the court. And that's what Scola is. I think Adelman was initially concerned about the matchups defensively, which is why he took Luis out. But at the end, I think Scola instead of Novak would have made more sense (Novak never, under any circumstance, puts you in a better position defensively). Adelman went with Novak, I suspect, because T-Mac asked that he be put him in.
Agree with durvasa. This is a precise assessment of what goes wrong in the fourth. Shooters like Novak and Battier are neutralized without penetration and/or an inside offensive presence. Sacramento along with the Sixers and NO took away Yao (our only inside threat), so the burden of penetration fell on our two best penetrators on the floor, McGrady and Alston. Successful penetration is as much as a determination to do it as it is a skill. Sometimes, McGrady just has to force the issue and penetrate for our offense to work. I'd rather have T-Mac successfully/unsuccessfully try to drive it in than have him or Rafer settle for difficult jumpers. The best way to counter aggressive on-the-ball defenders like Artest is to drive past them. It seems that T-Mac either didn't have the energy to do so, having played most if not all of the second half or lacked the will to do so. Like JVG has said many times in the past, when McGrady drives looking to score, that's when the Rockets are most dangerous. In a way, I would have liked to have seen Brooks inserted sometime in the early fourth quarter with 111 to not only spell Rafer but to also observe how his penetration skills could have jump-started our offense. Given our big lead going into the fourth (19 points I believe), I don't think it would have been too much of a risk to play AB then.
Yeah, that or he gets the ball to our all-stars because he trusts them to come through for us in clutch situations. That's seriously just looking for something wrong when it isn't there. Give me a break.
My reaction to the offensive stagnation would have been... "Well, we are ****ed exectuting against the zone anyway, might as well put in Chuck Hayes to see if we can get a few defensive stops (possible fast break opportunities?) and offensive rebounds off the shots we are clanking."
