Last Night In The NBA: Is It Time To Panic?
Welcome back to another edition of Last Night In The NBA where we catch you up on everything that happened from the night before in the Association. There were 5 games yesterday, most of which were fairly entertaining so it was a quality night of basketball. If by chance you weren’t able to watch, that’s OK, here’s what happened.
Wizards (6-5) 111 vs Lakers (5-7) 95
Remember a few weeks ago when WSH ran their mouth and then blew a gigantic lead to the Lakers in a pretty embarrassing loss? John Wall faded down the stretch? Well, last night was the exact opposite of that. The Wizards Big 3 were much better in this game, combining for over 60 points.
This was a night where Wizards fans got the good version of Wall, and I have to say that dunk and those blocks were certainly impressive.
The same goes for Beal and Porter Jr
The Wizards have been a little inconsistent lately, with mostly all bad losses, so to get back to .500 at home is a step in the right direction. They have the Hawks tomorrow, so things should start to get better for them if they keep playing like this.
For LAL, I hate you, but I’m willing to give you a piece of advice. Stop turning the basketball over. They had 19 TOs in this game, and when you pair that with stellar 36/13% shooting splits, what do you think is going to happen?
Sure they had 7 players in double figures which usually leads to wins, but they played some pretty gross basketball
Raptors (7-4) 122 vs Pelicans (6-6) 118
The Raptors are starting to round into form, winners of 3 of their last 4. It’s not as if the Pelicans are a super tough opponent or anything, but it was still impressive to see TOR score the most points in a game since they had 128 in their second game vs PHI. Maybe there is something to them playing really well against poor defensive teams or something. Anyway, DeRozan led the way with 33/8 and he did it in typical DeRozan fashion
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Lowry helped out with a solid 18/6/7 on 7-13, which even though he sort of lived behind the three point line a little too much, was still effective
It was also impressive that they got 19/8 in 31 minutes from Ibaka. You don’t see many 50 year old guys have that type of production. Giving up 118 points, especially at home isn’t very Raptor-like, so you could argue they were pretty fortunate their offense showed up.
For NO, this time it wasn’t just the Boogie/AD show! Other guys stepped up, even it if wasn’t enough. You had Jrue Holiday going for 34/11 on 14-20
Anthony Davis was relatively quiet with 18/7, but he did have this fancy behind the back pass that was impressive
and Boogie did his usual thing with 20/15/5 including this nasty stepback late
Rockets (9-3) 117 vs Cavaliers (5-7) 113
Poor Lebron can’t catch a break huh? In a matchup of two great players, both James Harden and Lebron definitely put on a show. In fact, this was probably the game of the night in my opinion. We’ll start with Harden, not just because he’s also an ASU guy, but because his team won. His 35/11/13/5 was pretty goddamn impressive
I’ll never get how people don’t love watching Harden play. But he didn’t do it alone! The Rockets played only 8 guys in this game, and outside of Ryan Anderson, if you played more than 5 minutes, you were in double figures. Eric Gordon helped out with 20 of his own including 4 made threes, and Clint Capela continues to have a very very solid year, tossing in 19/13 including the game winning alley oop
Early MIP candidate maybe?
For CLE, like I said, Lebron continued to do stuff in Year 15 that doesn’t really make any goddamn sense
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and making even LESS sense was Jeff Green, who apparently is turning into a younger Lebron or something? Who is this Jeff Green and where the fuck was he as a member of the Celtics?
Is it weird that Green is probably the best player on the Cavs right now as we wait for Isaiah to get back? So weird.’
Kings (3-8) 109 vs Sixers (6-5) 108
Heartbreak for PHI no doubt. A game that was close throughout, it came down to the final two possessions and it’s like we hear so often, the NBA is a make or miss league. In this game, Kings fans got a glimpse of their future, with WCS playing well with 15 points on 6-11, and then rookies De’Aaron Fox and Justin Jackson coming up huge
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That game winner from Fox was cold blooded.
For PHI, this was also a glimpse into their future despite the loss, and I don’t know how you could say that future doesn’t look bright. Sure maybe they turn it over too much, but Simmons looked great in his 27 minutes with 18/6 on 6-8, and Embiid, well Embiid continues to be a basketball alien. he had 22/15
If we’re being honest, I was legit shocked when Embiid missed his chance at a game winner. The Sixers didn’t really get anything from their bench, so that has to be encouraging. The starters basically played their normal game, so moving forward if the Sixers could just get a little bench production, they’ll be fine.
Nuggets (7-5) 102 vs Thunder (4-7) 94
Is it time to panic in OKC? Did Brad Stevens really break the Thunder? I think he may have. They look AWFUL right now. The spacing is still all fucked, nobody is moving the ball, their offense looks nothing like what we all expected when this super team first joined forces. For the Nuggets, this game was all about Mudiay and him coming out of nowhere with 21/7/5 on 8-10 shooting
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I imagine this is the Mudiay that Nuggets fans have been dreaming of since he first got there. Jokic also was solid with 15/11 but really I’m just looking for an excuse to show this pass
Elite passing big men are my weakness, I can admit that.
For OKC, like I was saying, they stink right now. Melo had 28 on 10-20 which looked nice, but shocker, he had 0 assists!
Things get no easier for OKC as they have LAC/SA/NO/GS/DET on the horizon, so things could spiral fairly quickly if they don’t figure this shit out.
And that’s it! You’re now all caught up on everything that happened last night in the NBA. We have a slate of 8 games tonight, including BOS/CHA, LAC/OKC, and MIL/SA so if you’d rather go out and live your life on a Friday night instead of watch basketball, all the power to ya. Just make sure to check back here tomorrow morning for anything you may have missed.