Thunder allowing a Carlisle-coached team to get its teeth into a series is bad news for them. He's dragged numerous inferior teams before to beat the heavy favorites (2011 Heat) or nearly upset them (2014 Spurs, 2021 Clippers).
Thunder need to put the smack down in Game 4 or else they'll be staring down a historic Finals choke (68-win team, best ever net-rating) to one of the least pedigreed opponent ever.
Having Carlisle as a coach is the biggest ace the Pacers got in their pockets. Tell me again how coaching doesn't matter.
If Pacer wins this year Championship, it is all because of Carlisle, who make his team giving 120% performances
for all this talk about OKC's depth, they only play 8 players and look tired. They are also paying a guy 30 million who averages 19 minutes.
Only because Daigneault can't get over himself.
Going small is just idiotic, Chet is getting bullied.
That's the only way they play. I'm not sure they can redesign at this point. May still get them the chip though.
It's the reason Dallas took care of them last year, too. Mavs bullied them. Hartenstein was supposed to fix the issue.
Game 3 was the first time the refs called the okc defensive hacking- fouls.
it was a shock to the hackers and floppers like dort, sga, caruso…
pacers must turn up the heat in game 4 and its season over for the front runners
Yes
BUT
If Hali doesn’t make those 4 clutch shots they wouldn’t be in this position
Pretty much a toss up series if OKC wins game 4. Pacers are a bad matchup for OKC and have the best coach in the league so if they win this series, I won’t be surprised.
Without Carlisle's coaching Haliburton wouldn't have been in the position to make those clutch shots.
Nembhard has been the unsung hero this series. This guy is Ginobili-esque; just constantly making winning plays
If Duncan never makes the clutch bankshot against OKC the Spurs might not go to the finals in 2014. That's what you got your star players for.
yeah coaching matters but the players matters most than the coach. Players deserve more credit.
I still expect the Thunder to win out, but if they somehow lose this series, the Pacers have got to be the most unlikely champion of all time.
Thanks to Daigneault's arrogance in game 1, the typical home win and what's now got to be genuine belief for the Pacers, they've at least dumped all the external pressure on an overwhelming favorite that's young and inexperienced in this position.
Tell me again specifically what Carlisle is supposedly doing that's flummoxing Daigneault/Thunder.
Pacers are providing a blueprint for beating the Thunder, even if they don't close the deal.
Run at them with depth and wear them out. Use bigs to pummel them inside. Use your defense to hound SGA constantly while trying not to foul him. Keep your turnovers low.
OKC only going with 1 big for the entire series after starting Chet and Hartenstein together quite a bit during the season seems really bizarre
Moving away from double big before they even played a minute in the Finals was cuck-tastic tbh, especially for a team that won 68 games in the regular season. Seemed like something the old man would do back in the day tbh.
Just watched the last of this game 3.
Holmgren is soft and his release point is low - blocked 3 pt shot about 2 min mark - not a player even in the same zip code as Wemby.
OKC is a team living and dying by SGA hero ball.
OKC J Williams is undersized - see missed dunk - and stats likely inflated due to playing with SGA.
If Sochan can be Toppin that works otherwise we need to change him out.
OKC role players not impressive. IND more of a team but neither team’s role players strike me as much better than ours can be. I’m not even sure I’d swap our role players for theirs - either team.
Any 48-50 win team such as IND can gel at the right time and win it all. SAS could win that many games next season. Time to go all in!
the fact that you are asking this question is basically the answer to why you are thinking "coaching doesn't matter". You obviously can't identify adjustments.
-playing Haliburton off the ball and using him as the screener to free him up
-inverted Siakam/Haliburton pick & rolls
-using Siakam as an offensive hub for DHOs at the elbow, instead of putting him the post
-doubling SGAs from different angles
-attacking SGA on defense
-Haliburton rejecting the screen more often than not
-Turner blitzing the ball handler hard in pick & rolls
People need to come to terms with the fact that the thunder aren't as good as they thought they were. Ill keep repeating it, they barely beat Jokic and got lucky Curry didn't see them after that. They're a regular season team, even if they win they're beating what was considered to be one of the lesser teams in the walk over east at the begining of the playoffs.
If they don't win this year, its going to be interesting to see how long they can keep all those lottery picks on second contracts.
They won't get an easier year.
prisoner of the moment
Let's slow our roll on calling the Spurs le contenders. Still a lot of question marks for a team that hasn't been in the playoffs for 6 straight years and has currently 1 -2 players that have real playoff experience. I'm glad the front office is being linked to big name players. It shows they know they can't just "run it back" next year. Upgrade as much as you can, even if they are striking for the fences but fail. The only reason we keep Devin or Keldon is because the trades of them fell through.
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