2024 Playoffs Eastern Conference First Round: (2) New York Knicks vs (7) Philadelphia 76ers - The Danse Macabre
- Thread starter InstaFace
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Much like this version of the Heat the Cs are up against, who is going to score points for the Knicks in this hypothetical series? Jaylen Brunson sure as shit doesn't look like the answer after his first 2 games here.
I don't see it in terms of the Knicks being a tough match for BOS... sure they're gritty and physical, so are the Heat. But they can't score on a PHI team that has Embiid limping around despite PHI choosing to leave Hart and sometimes Donte wide open..... Celtics would have been up 25 in this game.
Honestly if he values his career going beyond this season, he should sit. There is no way he's not doing irreparable harm to himself by being out there like this.
The one thing going for the Knicks in a Celtics matchup is that the Cs do not have a Maxey who is just roasting them with quickness but of course we are all around way deeper and more versatile on offense. And at playoff level intensity our D will be an issue for them.
Anyways, that would be what, two series from now? They are going to be in many many rock fight games before then.
Anyways, that would be what, two series from now? They are going to be in many many rock fight games before then.
Brunson has to create shots in the halfcourt as the at is a staple of the Knicks sets. He can’t stop creating shots against the shot clock. This has been what many of us have been saying once the playoffs begin in that he doesn’t create the type of separation against playoff defense like say a Maxey.
I see on replay Nurse did go for the timeout, but Maxey never fully possessed the ball I thought, perhaps why the refs let that amount of contact go.
Brunson made that shot but he also damn near ruined the 4th quarter for the Knicks. He's going to step it up but sixers have his number right now. I've seen him make all the shots he's missing all season.
Exactly. They get a ton of offensive rebounds because they miss a lot of shots (21st in shooting %). And despite Brunson being the #5 player in the league against Tatum at #7, their offense was bottom half off the league. There's a reason the Celtics went 4-1 against them, the Celtics can match their defense and their offense is far superior. They need another star/scorer to hit that last tier.
I think the biggest argument against this is that Brunson had high usage during regular season and will almost certainly have high usage to get to the ECF. At some point, he may run out of gas but he’s fully capable of scoring 30-35 PPG against the Celtics with Donte, Hart, OG putting in 45-50. And then you hope your defense frustrates the Celtics into some lower scoring games.
He’s at a quickness disadvantage against these defenders. We are watching him be exposed when used as their go-to guy. He’s at his best in transition or with numbers in space….if the Knicks are going to continue utilizing him like this in the half court this is probably what you’re going to get. Not sure what Thibs can do without Randle’s shot creation though.
All I know is that this series could have involved the 1990s Knicks. The officials let them absolutely maul each other down the stretch and you could see players from both sides anticipating whistles that never came. Bully ball may be back!
Man, this Knicks team is extremely fun to watch and easy to root for. Even if I don't love the franchise, it's fun to watch a bunch of grinders just outwork teams.
Possible, but in the 172 minutes he's played this year against Boston he's been below his normal output in scoring and assists, and he's gotten obliterated on D. I think PHI (assuming even 80% Embiid) is the tougher matchup for BOS.
I don’t think the Knicks are a serious threat but I could see them frustrating the Celtics more than Miami will be able to with physical play. The Bucks remain the only somewhat real threat in the East.
Down 1 with 13 seconds left, I was so sure we were getting a Maxey buzzer beater for the win.
What we got was just about the exact opposite of that. You'd think Jim O'Brien was coaching them - "eh I dunno boys, just go out and sling it".
fake edit: oh wow, Jim O'Brien is actually a "senior advisor" for the 76ers. Maybe his utter resistance to designed ATO plays is seeping through the organization.
I don’t think either team has enough juice to beat us 4 times out of 7 but I also don’t see much value in looking at games when they had RJ Barrett in their lineup and not OG, a far superior wing defender. Eventually, the Celtics’ talent advantage would likely win the day but I could see it going 6 games or so. In any event, they’ll have to go through Milwaukee before I give this scenario much more thought.
Great job by Hartenstein in the 2nd half on those 10 foot shovel shots over Embiid, that was a wild game, with multiple swings each way, same as game 1. NY is very lucky to be up 2-0.
The reason I preferred PHI to MIA in the 7/8 game as a NY opponent was twofold, 1 is that Spoelstra destroys Thibs and 2 is that the Villanova Knicks love playing in Philly.
The reason I preferred PHI to MIA in the 7/8 game as a NY opponent was twofold, 1 is that Spoelstra destroys Thibs and 2 is that the Villanova Knicks love playing in Philly.
View: https://twitter.com/TimBontemps/status/1782607497901064202
I appreciate Morey's utter dedication to being a loser.
I appreciate Morey's utter dedication to being a loser.
Okay.
View: https://twitter.com/KendrickPerkins/status/1782601513397018883
And another thing before I move on. All those soft ass players that said they wouldn’t want to play for Thibs… guess what? Thibs don’t want to coach yall cupcake asses either. Carry on…
View: https://twitter.com/KendrickPerkins/status/1782601513397018883
And another thing before I move on. All those soft ass players that said they wouldn’t want to play for Thibs… guess what? Thibs don’t want to coach yall cupcake asses either. Carry on…
The Sixers are the whiniest organization in the NBA, and I have no idea who is in 2nd.
Reminds me of when a certain now-Sixers-GM tried to litigate his way to a 2018 WCF win.
View: https://twitter.com/NBCSPhilly/status/1782610896226812137
Or maybe Nurse has a point.
You Massholes should really check yourselves. Go look at how much crowing about an unfinished season you've already done, and whining about the lack of respect Tatum gets that have been posted over the past few months here. Well, your team has already put a historic regular season, and thanks to injuries to your potential opponents' superstars (Embiid, Giannis, Butler, Randle), the ECF is set up as a potential cakewalk for your team, so no excuses.
Because, of course, nothing could go wrong with their inevitable rise to a finally adding another banner to the increasingly dusty collection hanging in your rafters. Just like last year, when your hockey team also had a historic regular season and cruised to another championship. Please feel free to share in your inevitable vituperative responses all the pictures you took at last year's Bruins' Stanley Cup parade. Were you able to get a picture of the Cup? Hold it? Sip out of it? Please don't hold back a single instance of your joy on that day.
If your coach had been ignored like that while trying to call a timeout in a key situation at the end of the game, this board would have exploded in outrage over the injustice. Of course, that would be after it got over the shock of your coach actually trying to call a timeout in a key situation at the end of the game, which if I learned anything from my rare sojourns into this forum, is something he apparently lacks the sense to do.
Nice lash out, but if you think the Celtics are entitled in the eyes of the officials, you weren't tuned in for the Brad Stevens and Daniel Theis doormat era. It has taken JT's superstar status for them to nudge into slightly getting the benefit of the doubt on calls. (And of course the rules changed mid-season, so that edge has probably dropped now.)
Nurse has a strong argument for this one play, but he became the boy who cried wolf many years ago. He tends to ignore the benefit of the doubt his team gets more often than not, from habitual line-steppers like Kyle Lowry. I'm actually a big fan of Embiid, but there will be a level of Schadenfreude when Nurse in particular fails, just like I acknowledge fans of other teams will enjoy if/when the Celtics fail this season partially due to the hardo behavior of Coach Mazzulla.
this literally happened a month ago. Thanks for giving us massholes the opportunity to again always be right: you really get us!
The officiating has gotten really weird though. It’s bullshit Nurse didn’t get the TO. It wasn’t like he called it as the ball was leaving the inbounder’s hands. We’re all going lose our shit when something like that inevitably happens to the Celtics.
I’d lose my shit more if the Celtics look like a junior high B team on an inbounds play with the season on the line like the Sixers did.
But, yes, they should have gotten the TO there.
Nurse is one of the most demonstrative coaches in the league. He obviously wanted the ball inbounded as a preference as he didn't immediately call time-out. When he finally appeared to, obviously to avoid the 5-seconds, it was pretty calm and passive. Alas. On the second attempted call, play was hectic and maybe possession was questionable.
So, I think he did try to TO but was pretty low energy and just didn't get it. That's the Ref's bad, I guess. Alas. Why didn't he jump up and down and do his usual? I think the real mistake was not taking one immediately and advancing the ball. Again, alas.
Lowery probably should have called the TO when he didn't have the immediate clean in bound to Maxey. Because it was Lowery, I'll double "alas" that.
So, I think he did try to TO but was pretty low energy and just didn't get it. That's the Ref's bad, I guess. Alas. Why didn't he jump up and down and do his usual? I think the real mistake was not taking one immediately and advancing the ball. Again, alas.
Lowery probably should have called the TO when he didn't have the immediate clean in bound to Maxey. Because it was Lowery, I'll double "alas" that.
My anecdotal observation is that the refs are letting stuff go to an almost violent degree when it's a guy driving to the basket or in a crowd getting hacked. But then they're still calling stuff relatively tight when it's a one-on-one situation in open space. I can see why the lack of consistency is getting to the players.
edit: spelling
* Good thing for Nuggets fans that Malone didn’t “have the sense to call a timeout” to allow for LA to make defensive substitutions and set up their halfcourt defense.
* Nurse has a legit gripe here.
Bad calls happen in the NBA, that's life. Some benefit you some hurt you.
We're mocking Morey because he's closing in on a decade of repeated failures and after each one he files a grievance with the league. He's a loser, the entire mentality of the franchise is one of losers in which you would have won if only those dastardly refs called everything in your favor. The Sixers got maybe 1 bad call at the end of a game where they got a generally very good whistle (even their late lead was massively impacted by the refs making a pretty bizaare overturn of a foul call). Last year every time they lost a game it was... "oh the refs are so mean". That's for dumb fans on twitter not the GM of a professional basketball team.
We're mocking Morey because he's closing in on a decade of repeated failures and after each one he files a grievance with the league. He's a loser, the entire mentality of the franchise is one of losers in which you would have won if only those dastardly refs called everything in your favor. The Sixers got maybe 1 bad call at the end of a game where they got a generally very good whistle (even their late lead was massively impacted by the refs making a pretty bizaare overturn of a foul call). Last year every time they lost a game it was... "oh the refs are so mean". That's for dumb fans on twitter not the GM of a professional basketball team.
Maxey never had clean possession of the ball. The one time you can even argue he did, right after falling down but preparing to try to pass out of it from the ground, Nurse was not calling TO in that instant.
The fourth quarter officiating was absolutely awful.
As I often say, though, it was incompetent without being obviously biased. The Lowry reversal was insane; the lack of a call on the inbounds was insane; not granting Nurse a TO was bad. It's all over the place, and though at the very end those blown calls favored Knicks (as often happens for the more aggressive/physical team) over the full quarter it is much more a story of awful, uneven, unpredictable officiating than either team getting the consistent whistle, imo
As I often say, though, it was incompetent without being obviously biased. The Lowry reversal was insane; the lack of a call on the inbounds was insane; not granting Nurse a TO was bad. It's all over the place, and though at the very end those blown calls favored Knicks (as often happens for the more aggressive/physical team) over the full quarter it is much more a story of awful, uneven, unpredictable officiating than either team getting the consistent whistle, imo