The Round Up - November 4th, 2012

Stats Rundown:

Dwight Howard did a little bit of everything in his first victory in a Lakers uniform, finishing with 28 points, 7 rebounds and 3 blocks. Honorable mention to Kevin Martin who is not going to let the Beard out do him, scoring 28 points in the loss to the Hawks.

Board Monster: Nikola Vucevic used his magical touch to grab 13 rebounds in a surprise blow out of the Phoenix Suns. Who would have thought they would be on the other end and have a 2 game win streak.

Thief: Steve Blake who usually turns the ball over, got 5 steals today. So that's basically why the Lakers won today.

Butter Fingers: Kevin Durant was 2 assists shy of his first triple double, and was 4 turnovers away from a quadruple double. Jrue Holiday also lost the basketball 6 times today.

Rookie Watch:
Damian Lillard did not play today, therefore no one is deserving of this honor. (Alexey Shved got 8 points, and I know you don't care)

Time Machine User:
I guess Kobe Bryant didn't need his knee to be German treated, because he has been ballin'. In the first Lakers victory of the season, the Black Mamba scored 15 points, dished 8 dimes and grabbed 7 boards in the destruction of the poor Pistons.

Best Hair: Andrew Bynum showing us how to never change and be yourself, no matter how much money you get, you stick to your roots and remain HOBO (get it? I changed it from humble to hobo because he looks like one, haha I am sorry).
From @jemelehill:

Whoops: Dante Cunningham heel kicked J.J. Barea's forehead while going for a rebound. Tests confirmed he gave his own teammate a mild concussion. Two concussions in the last 4 days, when did I start watching football?

My Bad: Russell Westbrook saved the basketball from out of bounds under his own basket for a hustle play, too bad it didn't really work out because Al "weird ears" Horford caught it and dunked it. (Will update with video)

This must have been his reaction:

Who is this Melo person and why is he actually playing defense?

Highlight of the Night: Jeff Teague only knows one dunk and this time he did it properly.

The Round Up - November 3rd, 2012.

Stats Rundown:

Chris Bosh bagged the Nuggets with 40 points and 7 rebounds in the Heat victory. Our beloved James Harden has been dethroned, only scoring 24 points tonight.

Board Monster: Anderson Varejao's hair caught 17 balls that missed the rim.

Butter Fingers: James Harden, Monta Ellis, Shawn Marion, Tony Parker, Stephen Curry, Andre Iguodala, Isiah Thomas and Kyle Lowry all lost 5 basketballs today.

Rookie Watch:
Damian Lillard is not playing like a rookie, scoring 20 points and 9 assists, making him and Oscar Robertson are only players in NBA history with at least 20 points and 7 dimes in their first 3 games. And he becomes the first NBA player to score at least 20 points in each of his first three career games since Grant Hill in 1994. (Via @TrailBlazersPR)

Time Machine User: Paul Pierce dropped 27 and grabbed 7 boards in a victory against the young Washington Wizards.

Thief: Nicolas Batum took away 6 basketballs for the first time (Career high).

Free Basketball:
The Portland Blazers beat the Houston Rockets 95 to 85 in overtime.
The Indiana Pacers beat the Sacramento Kings 106 to 98 in DOUBLE overtime.

Puzzled Commentator: He really didn't want Blake Griffin to take that jumper.

Unfitting Mascot in Brooklyn: Presenting the Brooklyn Knight, even I can't make fun of this, it is already a joke in it self. I am just guessing they ran out of ideas and just took the team name from Like Mike. (Via @YouBigDummy) Looking like an evil power ranger.

Blake Griffin Face of the night: That is quite a surprise face, thank you NBA.com.

Quote of the night:
From @JMcDonald_SAEN: Manu proclaims himself "very happy" to be back on floor, then corrects himself: "Wait ... happy is not a word anymore." This is how you discipline players, Coach Pop knows what he is doing.

Highlight of the night:
Kyrie Irving played the Bulls tonight, so he did a Derrick Rose-y lay up remind them of the pain.

Game Winners:
Brandon Jennings with his best Derek Fisher impression.

Oh no! LeBron passed up another game winning opportunity, but this time he got it to the guy with the long resume.

The Feed: Toronto Raptors vs. Brooklyn Nets [11/03/12].

 Recap:

The Brooklyn Nets defeated the Toronto Raptors 107 to 100 in their first regular season game in the brand new Barclays Center. The Raptors came out to a blazing hot start scoring 35 points in the first quarter at 62.5%. But the Nets manage to fight back into the game, scoring 33 points in the second quarter to take the lead at halftime, a lead that Toronto never managed to comeback from.

On a night, the supporting Raptors struggled, Kyle Lowry (28 points, 8 assists and 8 rebounds) and Demar DeRozan (25 points) put the team on their backs and carried 53% of the offense. The 8 turnovers in the second quarter killed Toronto and destroyed the beautiful ball movement they had in the first quarter.

Brooklyn outscored Raptors in paint 52 to 34, much thanks to Brook Lopez who led all Nets with 27 points, Deron William added 19 points and 9 assists. Raptor's early reliance on the jumper, which did hit early came back to haunt them and only resorted to attack the basket late in the game.

Offensive End:
The Raptors like to look for Andrea Bargnani and Demar Derozan early. Andrea usually set a a pick early and instead of rolling hard like the other big men on the Raps, he flares out for a jumper. Demar Derozan get freed by off ball screens (2 of them and allows him to get the ball at the other wing).

Kyle Lowry likes to push the ball off a missed shot, in this game, he took the first shot available. If the defense is set, he will run a pick and roll to attack the basket and will kick out to the open man if given the opportunity.

Jose Calderon is a lot different, he likes to slowly dissect the defense and often (basically all the time) use the pick and roll to create offense.

From what I can remember Brooklyn didn't have specific offensive tactic, the only thing was the deep baseline screen, used to free the player that will likely shoot the ball upon catching it. Otherwise, it is just Deron William's dribble penetration to create chaos within the defense. They did start sloppy early, especially Joe Johnson, who did struggle tonight shooting 5 for 13, with 14 points. He forced a lot of shots, but did not revert back to ISO-JOE, which is a good sign for the Nets.


Defensive End:

Toronto looked great in the 1st quarter, rotating in symphony, reading the offense well and timed the help perfectly, but it ended there. There was a period of good defense in the fourth quarter comeback, it was just too late.

As you would have predicted, the Net's defense was not great either. They do hedge the pick and roll surprsingly well, other than that, they need to work on their rotation, they were slow to recover and the Raptors bailed them out by taking jumpers. When Reggie Evans is on, the defense turns to another level, he really bothers the bigs.



The Moments:

• Brook Lopez has a serious T-Shirt tan, distracted and bothered me the entire game.
• The Betty White temporary tattoo promised, did not happen. Which makes Deron Williams the worst person ever.
• Not once did Jay Z and Beyonce looked excited when the camera was on them. It is no Knicks vs. Net, but it was still a tight game.

Rookie Watch:

Jonas Valanciunas didn't get much action today, got in foul trouble early, finished with 2 points and 3 rebounds.

The Feed: Miami Heat vs. New York Knicks [11/02/12].

Recap:

In the opening night at the Madison Square Garden, the New York Knicks defended their home court with a 104 to 84 victory over the Miami Heat. I guess the old guys must have been drinking their milk and eating their vitamins because they completely shut down all of Heat's role players and managed to keep all their joints intact.

Miami never led in this game, the big three combined for a total of 50 points, led by LeBron's 23 points and 7 rebounds, Wade's 15 and Bosh's 12/11. They had absolutely no help, besides Rashard Lewis (16 points), no one scored more than 6 points.

You would have thought that maybe Hurricane Sandy might affect New York a little, but they were on fire today, knocking down 19 three pointers, 5 of which came from Steve Novak, who finished with 17 points in the blowout win. Carmelo Anthony led all scorers with 30 points, 10 rebounds and put on a defensive clinic with the rest of his team forcing 21 turnovers, which is a sentence that I never thought I would ever have to type.


Offensive Set:

The Heat didn't run the ball like they did against Boston, and they suffered. Majority of the time, they just stood around and watched LeBron make something happen, the usual cuts and energy was not present. There were a few pick and rolls here and there and that was about it.

The Knicks exploited Miami's ball handler trap, recognizing it early and allowed threes followed by more threes. They start most possessions with a high Tyson Chandler screen, which activates the trap. Chandler quickly rolls, making the perimeter defender (Shane Battier) come down to help, leaving one of the wings wide open for a three. The key was quick ball movement with dribble penetration, and a surprisingly low amount of Melo isolation plays.

Defensive Set:

Miami was not themselves today, their quick rotations weren't always there, especially with Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis, who were both slower on the move. The ball handler trap was in effect, but New York was quick to move the ball and it turned out to hurt them.

I haven't seem New York play such great defense in the Melo era since, ever. The individual defense was amazing, they moved quick and bothered everything. Tyson held it down, and altered any shot that came his way.

The Moments:

• Jason Kidd tipped one of LeBron's passes into his own basket.

• Am I the only one that is super bummed that Iman Shumpert was injured and we didn't get a flat top off between Norris Cole and him? Completely ruined my Friday.
• SHEEEEEEEDDDDDD!

• Unfortunately, he didn't get called for a technical, which is super disappointing.

Rookie Watch:

 

Nothing today.