Wednesday NBA Roundup: Knicks Showing Signs That Better Basketball Is on Its Way
This is going to sound like backhanded praise, but the New York Knicks are bad in a lot of the best ways.
They mostly play hard, they've got some intriguing young talent and there are real signs of progress this year after a seriously dispiriting 2014-15 season. Most of those positives were on display in a 96-86 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers on Wednesday.
New York got off to a nice start, looking loose and fluid in building a 32-18 advantage by the end of the first quarter. Things went a little sideways from there, perhaps because the Knicks lost the advantage of having a sixth defender on the floor midway through the second period:
That's when LeBron James, infamous hater of sleeves, decided his excessive armwear would hamper his shot no longer. He Hulkamania'd those bad boys and, perhaps not coincidentally, played much better afterward.
He'd go on to finish with a game-high 23 points.
So, yes, James and his Cavaliers got the victory. And yes, there was still some pretty high-level Knicking going on. Examples included Carmelo Anthony having zero concept of the shot clock late in the second quarter, an unfortunately familiar problem, per Chris Herring of the Wall Street Journal:
There was also a stretch of more than five minutes without a field goal, plus the requisite foul trouble for rookie megastar (slight exaggeration. Slight.) Kristaps Porzingis.
But generally speaking, this year's version of the Knicks is just, well...way more fun. And that counts for something because a lot of that fun is tied to hope—hope you can see in slickly timed finishes like this one:
And in the notable recurrence of follow dunks like this from Porzingis:
Add Kevin Love to Zinger's growing list of victimized power forwards. He got LaMarcus Aldridge on Monday.
Even stuff like Kyle O'Quinn's "I didn't know he had that" Dirk-style, one-legged fadeaway is exciting:
These aren't just empty highlights. They're signs that the Knicks are adding the right kind of talent and are, very slowly, figuring out smarter ways to use it. There's still an awful lot of outdated triangle-offense action, but there's also some intriguing floor-stretching going on. It's going to be a long process, but it's really not so hard to see the outline of a playoff team...in a year or so.
Porzingis scored 13 points, snatched two steals and stuffed two shots in just 21 minutes. And at least a couple of those five fouls he accumulated were the result of shaky perimeter defense letting the Cavs guards get into the lane with a head of steam. He's got a few things to work on defensively, but he's not the hopeless foul magnet the box score suggests.
Jerian Grant and Derrick Williams are imperfect players, but they're generating attacks on the rim at a rate the Knicks just didn't get a year ago, per Herring:
And Langston Galloway is a strong defender who can knock down treys. He hit three of five long-rangers on Wednesday and seems deserving of Jose Calderon's starting job.
That's a lot of modest praise for modest pieces, but consider how lost, hopeless and generally depressing these Knicks were a year ago. Now, they're younger, they just finished hanging with the East champs for a good chunk of this game and, even after a loss, they're a respectable 2-3 on the year.
New York is still mostly bad, but you can kind of see the path to good these days—unless Iman Shumpert's hair is in the way (h/t NeoSportsInsiders.com's Matt Loede):
It's hard to see anything over whatever that is.
Stay patient, Knicks. You're getting there.
We Need to Change the Rules
Paul George provided the Indiana Pacers with 26 points and 10 rebounds in a 100-98 win over the Boston Celtics, though that wouldn't have been the result if I were in charge of NBA rule changes.
Because Jae Crowder did this:
And in my totally fictional NBA dictatorship, that bucket's good. And you know what else? That's worth...let's say four points.
Unfortunately, the league hasn't yet recognized how much fun it would be if teams started trying to make these shots all the time. Missed opportunity, if you ask me.
Bradley Beal Makes It All Better
Washington Wizards head coach Randy Wittman got the kind of defensive effort he'd been asking for, but it only came in spurts.
Fortunately, Bradley Beal brought enough timely offense to give the Wiz a thrilling 102-99 win over the visiting San Antonio Spurs:
Wittman drew up a heck of a set, and Beal totally dusted LaMarcus Aldridge in the resulting mismatch.
Game over.
Now, back to the bigger picture.
"The commitment to defend is not there," Wittman told reporters after a 117-110 home loss against the New York Knicks on Oct. 31. On Wednesday, the Wizards held the Spurs to an 0-of-8 start from the field, which helped build a startling 19-2 advantage midway through the first quarter.
John Wall hounded Tony Parker all over the hardwood as the rest of the Wizards denied passing angles, cleaned the glass and ran the ball right back down the floor after San Antonio's misses. Washington was clamping down and quickly getting into its new free-flowing offense.
And then the Spurs Spursed, which NBA.com's Dan McCarney colorfully described:
San Antonio worked to find the shots it wanted, got them and hit them. Washington's massive lead was gone by the end of the first quarter, and San Antonio nursed a decent advantage into the final period. But the Wizards surged back, outscoring the Spurs by 10 in the fourth quarter and getting Beal's game-winner just seven seconds after Tony Parker hit a game-tying trey on the other end.
Beal finished with 25 points, five rebounds, four assists and three steals on 11-of-22 shooting, while John Wall put up 17 points, 13 dimes and four steals. Those two performances (and Beal's big bucket) are worth celebrating, and Wittman can still harp on his team for letting a huge early lead slip away.
If you're a head coach, that's kind of the best of both worlds.
Kent Bazemore Will Get You
The Atlanta Hawks took care of the Brooklyn Nets with a 29-17 fourth-quarter blitz, though Kent Bazemore broke Brooklyn's spirit much earlier than that:
That'll do just fine until Thabo Sefolosha is ready to start full time. And if Bazemore keeps up the highlight-level defense while scoring efficiently (he was 3-of-6 from the field and 2-of-3 from deep), maybe the Hawks won't shake up the first unit at all.
Great news for the Nets, though: They can still lose another 13 straight without setting the record for most consecutive defeats to start a season. News that's less great: They set that record, 0-18, in 2009.
The Warriors and Clippers Delivered
It was close, it was heated and it was entertaining. Stephen Curry hit some absurd 30-footers en route to 31 points, and Chris Paul commanded the game in ultra-efficient fashion in response.
So basically, the Golden State Warriors and Los Angeles Clippers gave us what we wanted—unless you're a Clippers fan, in which case the 112-108 loss wasn't quite what you were hoping for.
Harrison Barnes led a fourth-quarter surge with a personal 10-1 run in under 90 seconds. Then Curry scored 13 in a row to ice the game. The Dubs remain unbeaten, having vanquished a slate of opponents entirely comprised of participants in last year's playoffs.
Los Angeles falls to 4-1, narrowly missing a chance to make a major statement in the West.
We've got three more of these this season, folks. Here's hoping they're all as good as this one.
Jabari Parker Returns...Alone
Hey! Jabari Parker made his return Wednesday, starting and playing for the first time since tearing his ACL last December.
His teammates celebrated by duping him into running onto the floor by himself for warm-ups (h/t Milwaukee Bucks):
If we're going by games played, I guess he's still basically a rookie. So, fair game.
This will never get old. Can we start a petition for teams to do this at least once a week?
Parker had two points and four rebounds in 16 minutes of the Milwaukee Bucks' 91-87 win over the Philadelphia 76ers. Look for his playing time and role to expand as he gets his legs back under him.
The Blazers Are Going to Make It Interesting
Total rebuilds aren’t supposed to be this much fun, but thanks to the high-scoring exploits of Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum, the Portland Trail Blazers are making this construction process more entertaining than most. Trail Blazers PR shared their combined scoring stats:
Is that good?
Lillard scored 35 points on 14-of-27 shooting, while McCollum tossed in 27 on 10-of-13, continuing his early-season breakout. The resulting 108-92 win over the Utah Jazz pushed Portland’s record to 3-2 and, for now, it suggests the Blazers aren’t quite ready to relinquish the playoff spot they had last year—you know, the one everybody expects the Jazz to snatch up.
There will be some rough times ahead for Portland, but it looks like there’ll be enough big nights from the backcourt to make them worthwhile.
Toronto Sits Atop the East
Despite trailing by six with 2:17 to go, the Toronto Raptors escaped with a 103-98 road win against the Oklahoma City Thunder. The victory was their fifth in a row and easily their most significant of the young season. Wins over Indiana, Boston, Milwaukee and Dallas might have cast some doubt on a perfect record. But now, there’s little to question about the only undefeated team in the Eastern Conference.
Toronto’s defense remained stellar, and it got an assist from a late-game OKC attack that (are you ready for this?) got a little stagnant.
DeMar DeRozan led the way with 28 points, countering Russell Westbrook's 22 points and 16 assists and Kevin Durant's 27 points.
We’ve seen Toronto’s hot starts turn into brutal second-half collapses before (see: last year), but this feels like something real.
