Okay, so by this point everybody knows that nobody on that team is going to drive to the basket. All they do is stand around and shoot jump shots -- I guess they haven't paid attention to how that strategy paid off for Dallas, but anyways. Boozer will dazzle everybody with the occasional post move or Harpring will post up and attack from time-to-time but otherwise their offense is as predictable as they come. Telling statistic: 7/72 shots they attempted last night were inside 10-feet of the basket. So my question is how do you adjust to this? How do you aggressively pressure the shooter without fouling or giving away the driving lines? What do you do? Do you keep doing what we're already doing by basically forcing them to make those shots? Hope that those shots wont fall on the road in a crucial game seven? With the exception of last night, I feel that we've done an excellent job defending that spineless "flop fish" Memo Okur. For the majority of the series he would receive the ball at the top and immediately Hayes (usually), Howard or Yao would be in his face pressuring him forcing the inevitable pass since he's an NBA All-Star capable of doing nothing else! What about everybody else?
First off, we need to stop those cuts to the basket, as we did in game 5, because that gave them around 10-15 easy points. Boozer didnt do much, so we just need to keep doing what we did there. I think the biggest adjustment we have to make is get Rafer to go through the picks instead of under them (Deron got several easy jumpers because of that). Also, we need to stop collapsing so much on penetration (the few times it happens) and really get up on Okur and Giricek. Basically, just play a little smarter and be more aware of how they are scoring (such as Juwon not drifting into the middle and leaving Okur open for that 3 which ended the game).
The Jazz have always been like that. It's nothing new. To stop it you need a team with an atheletic defensive core that can switch on most picks, fight through the others, and stay with their men on curls. This is why the Bulls were so successful against those great Utah teams in 97 and 98. They had Harper, Pippen, Jordan, and Rodman giving the Jazz offense fits. As far as we go, we kinda have this with Tracy, Shane, and Chuck, but Rafer's height and Yao's speed (or lack thereof) still give up lots of good looks. We'll just have to combine our defense with our ability to beat the Jazz's offensive strategy in the same manner as the mid 90s Rockets, by simply having the better stars and post play on the court.
Field goals attempted in the lane that result in free throws are not counted in that stat. And Yao/T-Mac shot alot of free throws in the first 3 quarters...
No, it doesn't but i'm sure you watched the game too. 12/19 of their FT attempts came in the 4th quarter -- most of which came when the outcome had already been decided. Even Stockton and Miller kept pointing out how the Rockets had been the more aggressive team and had gotten to the line more throughout the series.
Yeah, they were more aggressive, but T-Mac went to the bucket several times in the 4th and got fouled with no call. Nothing you can do about it.
Ah, missed that, thought this was a knock on the Rockets and their propensity for shooting the J. But agreed, cant stop a team when they shoot a bunch of Js. Its generally a low percentage shot, but the Jazz were just hot. I mean, Kirilenko hitting a 22 footer??? I have always felt its tough to beat any team in the league if they hit their jumpers at a high clip. You can work on stopping penetration, but the ball moves faster than people do so there will always be open/lightly contested jumpshots.
