FICKS THE KNICKS
-VS-
Game Time Start: 7:00 PM ET
Where: Madison Square Garden, New York, NY
Officials: J. Crawford, S. Corbin, D. Stafford, J. Goble
Television:
Radio: WFNI 1070 AM / WEPN 98.7 FM
Media Notes: Indiana Notes, New York Notes
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PACERS Danny Granger - left knee surgery (out) KNICKS Steve Novak - back spasms (questionable) Amar'e Stoudemire - right knee debridement (out) |
Avi Friedman: The Subtle Ways Lance Stephenson Lifts the Pacers Lance Stephenson came into this league as a physical specimen with loads of potential. For two years, that’s all he was: a physical specimen who lacked maturity, control and defensive determination. Over the past season we have seen him grow before our very eyes. Until this year, every time Lance made a good play, I used to be worried that he would get over confident and turn the ball over on the next possession. Now I want him to touch the ball on every possession, and at times I even think the Pacers should try running the offense through him. As the regular season wore on, Stephenson was given more playing time and asked to take on a larger role. At some point he realized how much he actually meant to this team and fully bought into it. The further we got into the season, the more Lance figured out ways he could help this team. A player who thrived in high school by making highlight plays quickly became determined to help his team by making unflashy plays. “It’s coming around that he knows we need him,” said Paul George after Indiana’s Game 1 win over New York. “We need him to play a huge role.” Lance has always been a player capable of making jaw-dropping passes but at times has struggled at finding the “right” or “simple” pass. On this play, Lance is given the ball to pass to Paul George in the post. Lance determines that passing to Paul will be ineffective so he looks to pass it back to the point guard, George Hill. However, Pablo Prigioni is blanketing Hill, so Lance quickly looks for his next option, which is Roy Hibbert. Roy quickly hands it off to Hill who ends up getting it inside to West for an easy layup. Lance doesn’t get an assist for this; heck, he doesn’t even get a hockey assist. But this is a play on which, earlier this year, he likely would have tried to force the ball to one of the Georges. Of course, he’s still more than willing to make the flashy play when he get’s the chance: Here he catches Raymond Felton ball-watching on the rebound and cuts down low for the tomahawk jam. When I first saw Lance Stephenson play, he seemed extremely out of control. He just seemed careless with ball and always attempting to beat his man off the dribble. Now, while he still looks like Taz to first-time onlookers, those who’ve grown used to watching him play are able to appreciate how calm he looks. Notice on these three plays how he’s able to draw defenders by making moves to the basket that free up open teammates: Here, Lance makes a move to the basket that causes a series of rotations by the Knicks and ultimately leads to an open DJ Augustin three. Tyson Chandler is aware of Lance’s open-court ability and willingness to attack in transition, so he rushes to get back to defend the paint. This leaves Roy Hibbert open from mid range. The big fella catches a no-look pass from Lance and drains it. Watch Lance draw Felton in and pass to the guy who was 3-for-3 from downtown at that point in the game. Augustin pump fakes, gets Felton in the air and ends up getting an easy layup. Throughout, Lance just looks so calm. It’s crazy...CONTINUE READING AT 8p9s |
Dylan Murphy: KnicksTape - How To Solve The Hibbert Problem Kidnap him. Or... "Anthony, drives middle, straight at Hibbert... Blocked!" How many times did we see this play in Game 1? 14,368 times, approximately. So why is Roy Hibbert so effective in these plays? Because he throws his hands straight up in the air and doesn't move. It also helps that he's 7-2. And what's worse for the Knicks is that his defense remained superb and consistent against two classic Knicks' offensive sets. 1) Here we have Carmelo Anthony in his super effective (note: not effective) baseline isolation with Hibbert in a help position. Anthony proceeds to barrel into the paint, only to meet Hibbert with his hands straight up in the air. Anthony tries to draw the foul; the refs aren't having it because Hibbert's hands are, well, straight up in the air. Sure, he may have fouled Anthony once or twice throughout the game, but his defense was exceptional in its stability. And it probably doesn't help that Melo whines at the refs every and all game. But what's important here - and different from the Celtics' defense against Melo - is that they don't have to stack the paint with a strong side overload. Boston didn't have a Roy Hibbert; they negated their lack of size by generally cramping things up. What Hibbert does, more than just protect the hoop, is allow Indiana's perimeter defenders to mostly stay at home. So when Melo is driving to the basket, there's really no one to whom he can kick the ball out. David West stays on Shumpert. George Hill barely leaves Felton. Lance Stephenson is only in the vicinity because he foolishly tried to swipe the ball from Anthony as he drove in. The only real help defender is Hibbert. But, as we saw all game, that's all Indiana really needs. Now at full speed: 2) With Melo or Felton or anyone as the ball handler in the pick-and-roll, all Hibbert did was back up and keep backing up and back up some more and then back up. There was oodles of space to attack. Take advantage, right? Well, not exactly. What Indiana is doing is forcing the Knicks into the least efficient shot in the game: the mid- range jumper. With Hibbert in protect-the-rim-mode and the rest of Indiana's defense committed to staying at home against shooters (that's all Frank Vogel yelled about in "Wired" segments), it left the Knicks with only two options: pull up or take your chances one-on-one against the big fella. On this pick-and-roll, Anthony decides to attack. But check out how far backed up Hibbert is as the Tyson Chandler pick is being set, as well as the position of the other Indiana defenders. Hibbert's already in the paint before Anthony even crosses the three-point line. Indiana's other defenders are not even remotely concerned with the paint (only Stephenson ends up doing his dumb swipe thing). This matchup - Hibbert vs. anyone - is exactly what Indiana wants. It's a sort of cruel irony that the Knicks are now being punished for their offensive aggression. Against Boston, all we ever wanted was some paint penetration. But now that they're facing Indiana, the Knicks are forcing it at the rim a bit much. And now the play in real time: 3) Here Felton selects the other option, the pull-up. But again, notice Hibbert's complete disinterest in whatever's going on near the three-point line: Felton has nowhere to go with the ball; Hibbert dares him to shoot. He does, and he misses. Granted this shot is particularly wide open, and there's often the threat of the picked defender lurking for a block from behind. But you've got the point, hopefully. Indiana is dangling mid-range cupcakes in front of New York. Okay, great. What's the solution? Glad you asked!...CONTINUE READING AT POSTING AND TOASTING |
Jared Dubin: Was Carmelo Anthony the victim of uncalled fouls? It’s become something of a common refrain among Knicks fans that Carmelo Anthony “never gets any calls.” (Full disclosure: I am a Knicks fan, though I do not belong to this particular sect of fandom.) The story goes that the ratio of contact taken to fouls drawn for Carmelo is very high, and that he does not get the “superstar treatment” his peers are awarded by the whistleblowers. The complaints often reach a particular fever pitch against physical teams with bruising power forwards against whom Carmelo is matched – an early season Memphis game, multiple Bulls games, and the last two Pacers games immediately come to mind when recalling instances that fans were particularly adamant that Melo was getting the short shrift on the whistles. Before diving into the tape from Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals, let’s acknowledge a few facts facts. First, Carmelo Anthony drew an average 6.2 personal fouls per game this season, 4th in the NBA behind only Dwight Howard, James Harden and Kevin Durant, per NBA.com. Prorated per 36 minutes, Anthony drew just 0.1 fewer fouls than Durant, 0.4 fewer than Harden, and 0.5 more than LeBron James. Second, when compared to his superstar peers, Carmelo takes an unusually low percentage of his shots from inside the lane, where fouls are most often drawn. Only 33.6 percent of Anthony’s field goal attempts this season came from inside the lane, per NBA.com. By way of comparison, that number was 40.5 percent for Kobe Bryant, 44.1 percent for Durant, 47.6 percent for Harden, 49.9 percent for Russell Westbrook, 51.5 percent for James, and 60.1 percent for Dwyane Wade. Based on the foregoing, it’s tough to conclude that Anthony was the victim of a lack of calls throughout this season. Of course, those are just the numbers. You’d have to watch the tape of every game played this season and track “contact” compared to fouls drawn to really know if it were true, a task too tall for even the most intrepid NBA writer (note: I’m not the most intrepid NBA writer, I just liked that turn of phrase). As such, we’re going to stick strictly to Game 1 of the Pacers series to see if Carmelo was really the victim of uncalled fouls yesterday afternoon. Indiana was the league’s best interior defensive team this season. They surrendered the second fewest attempts per game in the restricted area and held their opponents to the lowest field goal percentage in the league on those attempts. Their opponents also shot the third worst percentage in the league on shots inside the paint, but outside the restricted area. Additionally, the Pacers were a pretty foul-averse team this season. Despite playing such tough interior defense, only eight teams sent opponents to the free throw line less often as a percentage of field goal attempts, per NBA.com. A look at Carmelo’s Game 1 shot chart shows that he was unusually aggressive attacking the basket – 13 of his 28 field goal attempts – 46.5 percent, a stark 11.9 percent increase from his season-long average – came inside the lane. From watching the tape, it’s clear that it was a priority of his to get into the lane and challenge Indiana’s bigs at the rim. 12 of those attempts came inside the restricted area, and he made only three. Those plays were the primary source of ire among Knicks fans who felt Melo was wanting for calls in Game 1. With use of video from mySynergySports, I re-watched the game with a close eye on whether Anthony was the victim of a blown call on any given play, with special attention paid to those plays where he attempted a shot inside. In the interest of posterity, we’ll examine only the plays that were possible fouls and leave the relatively clean and uncontested jumpers aside. We’ll start midway through the first quarter with a play that would become emblematic of something we’d see throughout the afternoon. Anthony drives the lane and challenges Hibbert at the rim. Hibbert, rather than jumping out toward Melo to contest the shot, jumps straight up and backwards so as to ensure he does not make contact and get called for a foul. The referee rightly keeps his whistle in his pocket. Here is the first time Carmelo actively gripes about an uncalled foul, something that would happen numerous times throughout the game. Hibbert starts his challenge inside the restricted area and again jumps straight up and backwards to avoid fouling Anthony. His arm swings down at the last second, after Anthony has already put up his layup. Sometimes this is called a foul, sometimes it’s not. Later in the first quarter, on a play where Anthony was called for a travel, we get a picture perfect look at Hibbert’s style of contesting shots at the rim. Hibbert’s 7’2″ frame is perfectly straight up and down, and again he is jumping up and backwards rather than thrusting his body toward Anthony at the moment he goes up for his shot. It happened to be irrelevant on this play because Melo shuffled his feet before the shot, but it is still a good view of Hibbert’s style. It’s hard to tell if Anthony is just pumped up or in want of a foul on this play, but it again appears to be a rather perfect contest at the rim from Hibbert. At risk of sounding like a broken record, he simply jumps straight up and backwards rather than forwards when contesting the shot. His arms are long enough that he can still be in the way of the attempt even while falling back and out of bounds. On the layup attempt off the rebound, Carmelo is relatively uncontested and clearly untouched. It’s likely that there are two fouls on this play. First, on Paul George for putting both hands on Carmelo’s back and shoving him slightly while he’s battling for position on the block. This is the kind of by-the-book foul that rarely gets called and would draw tons of “REALLY? You’re calling THAT a foul? Did you even watch the Grizzlies-Clippers series?!?” comments on Twitter. However...CONTINUE READING AT HOOP CHALK |
James Herbert: Setting the Pace How Paul George went from an Unheralded Recruit to Starring in the NBA Playoffs Neither the New York Knicks nor the Indiana Pacers had particularly easy times of it in the first round. It took six for each to advance, and the Knicks almost let their opponent, the Boston Celtics, come back from a huge deficit to send it to seven. But alas, the clear- cut second- and third-best teams in the East meet for a chance to, in all likelihood, face the juggernaut Heat in the East finals. Before the Most Improved Player Award and the All-Star Game, before the 3-Point Shootout and the Slam Dunk Contest, before his first highlight on ESPN and the draft, there was the YMCA. When Indiana Pacers swingman Paul George played his first basketball game, he wore jean shorts. "They were pants and he cut ‘em into shorts," said his sister Teoisha George, now a fashion designer and formerly a forward at Pepperdine. "My sister and I, we were just cracking up. We were like, ‘Oh my God, look at him playing in jean shorts.’ All these other kids, they had their full YMCA uniform. "He was looking at us, like, ‘What are you guys laughing at?’ He didn’t see anything wrong with it." In a league with only 450 players, everyone has defied odds. But of all the kids in that YMCA, you wouldn’t think the kid wearing jean shorts would turn out to be one of the best wing defenders on the planet, guarding point guards and power forwards when required. You wouldn’t think that an NBA All-Star would arrive via Palmdale, Calif. and the WAC. A relative unknown coming out of Fresno State when the Pacers picked him No. 10 overall in the 2010 draft, George’s emergence was unlikely. He saw himself as a Tracy McGrady-type and possessed promising physical characteristics at 6’8 and 214 pounds with exceptional leaping ability, but there is a lengthy list of athletic wings who never approached stardom. Shooting up two inches to 6’10 and expanding his game in the seasons since, he’s gone from a solid starter to the face of the Pacers, averaging 17.4 points, 7.6 rebounds and 4.1 assists per contest this year. He started the 2013 postseason with a 23-point, 11-rebound, 12-assist triple-double and led Indiana in all of those categories -- plus steals -- in its first-round series against the Atlanta Hawks. If you’re wondering how he got here, his never-satisfied attitude provides a hint. "At 23, I know I’m nowhere close to where I want to be and where I need to be and where I’m going to be," George said, "but I guess it’s a good start to see where I am." Growing up in the small desert town of Palmdale, George didn’t play a lot of organized basketball as a child. He loved the game and played "every free moment he had," said Teiosha, but a lot of it was at the park or one-on-one against his older sister. He arrived at Pete Knight High School lanky and raw. "He was probably about six feet tall and he was as skinny as a rail," said Knight head coach Tom Hegre. "I knew at the time that [Teiosha] had been a tremendous player in high school and she was attending Pepperdine, so we knew there was a lot of potential for growth and development in Paul." Although George joined the varsity team early in his sophomore season, he wasn’t a star until he was a senior. As he got taller, he was asked to play on the inside, but he always wanted to play on the wing. He emulated McGrady and his favorite player, Kobe Bryant, when working on his ball-handling and outside shot. As the only non-senior in the starting lineup...CONTINUE READING AT SB NATION |
Pacers Mike Wells @MikeWellsNBA Jared Wade @8pts9secs Tim Donahue @TimDonahue8p9s Tom Lewis @indycornrows |
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