No timeout?

You have maybe the best 1 on 1 player in the league with a rebound and driving downhill the entire court to get to the basket with minimal defenders. Hardens typically beats two or three players in that situation for an easy hoop. Unfortunately, on this one play, he made a few bad decisions on where to drive with the ball (left instead of to the middle), who to pass it to (Howard instead of Jones for the win), and when asking for it back, not being aware of the clock and going to the hole very aggressively.

I was thinking why didn't McHale call timeout out as well, but honestly after looking at it over and over again, we would not have gotten a better opportunity. The problem was EXECUTION, not the play. The opportunities were there.

 

As McHale explained the post-game, you have on Warriors player falling down and one out of bounds after the rebound. No matter what play you draw up in the timeout, you won't ever have two defenders out of the picture on a fast break. Again, this was the right call by McHale and he'd do it again.

The issue is with Harden. As brilliant as he had played, he needs to learn to trust in his teammates to make the open pass. As soon as he sees the double team, he needs to figure out a way to get rid of it unless he's absolutely wide open. 8 seconds may seem like a long time, but you really don't have that much time to make a lot of 1-on-1 moves to shake your defenders. Either you have a clean look or you get rid of it to someone who's wide open.

 

I am okay with it, like McHale said, "I'll take our best player in a broken play any day of the week."

Had Harden hit a game winner, McHale would be getting praise right now for letting them run it out.

However, they should have called a timeout when Harden passed it over to Howard. At that point, it was obvious that we probably were not going to get a good shot off.

But I am okay with the no timeout. You have to take risks in late games and this one did not work out.

 

It was the right call until you determine that Golden State got back. They did. There was nothing there. Or at least nothing that Harden saw. At THAT point you call the time out. Before you pass to Dwight. If in your mind your best option with 5 seconds or whatever left if you are double teamed is to pass it to your non-shooting 50% free throw center outside the three point line, then you call the time out as passing to D12 24 feet from the basket is LOW percentage..