Brian Windhorst & The Hoop Collective - NBA Finals Game 6 Reaction: Game 7 Here We Come

Episode Date: June 20, 2025

Brian Windhorst is joined by NBA champion Iman Shumpert & ESPN's Time Bontemps to react live to Game 6 of the NBA Finals between the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Indiana Pacers. The guys talk the Thunder's awful turnovers, SGA's down game and the Pacers’ incredible defensive effort before talking expectations for Game 7. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, sports fans, the ESPN app has all of ESPN all in one place. The ESPN app is your home to thousands of live events, ESPN shows, and originals across every ESPN network and service. And now you can check if you already have ESPN Unlimited as part of your TV package for no additional calls. Visit activate.esPN.com to learn how to access your account or sign up, then start streaming in the ESPN app. It's all of ESPN all in one place. Sign up or activate now. Hello and welcome to the HOOP collective podcast. We talk about the NBA, which we're doing on the court here at Cambridge Fieldhouse. After game seven, Shump, Iman Shumpert, NBA champion.

They practiced today on this court to be having a trophy ceremony right now. They're all set for it. Tyrese Halliburton was cleared to play like an hour before the game. And he had an injury that some people. thought he would miss, you know, lots of time with it was in the regular season. And what we ended up getting was far and away the most surprising game of this finals where Indiana totally, totally dominated this game. After the first, like, five minutes.

It took him a second to get rolling. But again, we knew that was coming where it's like the crowd gets into it. I just knew the early push of the crowd. What I wasn't ready for was the T.J. McConnell. show. Holy man. It was the extra rebounds, the random steals, even the the getting in people's faces, the screaming for the crowd. He did everything that we were talking about needed to be done. You talk about a guy like Obie Topping shooting the ball this well with that much confidence, back against the wall. Like we did a lot of congratulating, no Casey, I think, before the game

and just talking about, you know, the tremendous effect they've had in the last couple of games. But to see this response from Indiana and to see that minus 40 next to Jalen. Yeah. So Jalen Williams was minus 40, got outscored by 40 points when he was on the court. That is the worst plus minus in the 40 year history of plus minus. We don't have anything in the finals. We don't have anything on record. I wouldn't expect for him to lay an egg. That was a shocker.

But again, that's one of the guys that we talked about if he doesn't go well. If it doesn't go well for him, it's hard to see OKC moving the way they move. To see a guy like Shay have a turnovers. It's hard to see them advance past that. It's like this is a guy that you're used to taking care of the ball, getting us a good shot. If he doesn't get a good shot for himself, exhausting to dribble till late shot clock, still being able to make great decisions.

We saw him search a little bit today. He took a little bit of the James Harden playbook searching for fouls to get to the free throw line. And you saw a lot of those no calls happen. Being on the road, sometimes, you know, your star, it is up to him to go up there and get us to the free throw line. Make sure everybody calms down, get us all on one page. But when those things don't go well and these guys are willing to turn it, into points that fast. They didn't have to manufacture a lot of offense

because they did a lot of running today. Well, yeah. So a big thing was turnovers. I really thought that, well, I'm going to stop right there. I'm going to start over. Let's do it. Tyrese Halliburton, we weren't sure he was going to be able to play more than five minutes in this game.

And if he was being bothered by that calf, I did not notice it. So I don't know what treatment he had. I don't know. what adrenaline he had. I don't know if it was gamesmanship, because obviously he looked bad. A prayer?

He looked terrible in game five, right? He looked really bad. I don't know. I can't tell you what it was. The will to win. I truly think that this is why he is trying to birth himself as a superstar,

a rock star at the least. This is the stuff that people do. You watch Isaiah Thomas do it. that foot looking like it's going to fall off. I don't care. Let it fall off. Yeah, so he had, he had 14. He was plus 25.

Jesus. Which just illustrates how important he was when he's out there. He scored 14 points and I had five assists by his standards. That wasn't like dominant. But he had three threes. And he didn't look like he was being hampered by it at all. Yeah. And so, in other words, they didn't have a weak link.

You know, and game five, they had a weak link with him out there. He had a play that impressed me. He got a deflection. I believe they threw on my outlet and he had the back pedal to catch the ball. Back pedal, caught the ball, went forward and then made that pass between two. Did it sort of look away. And in the middle of it, I'm thinking, like, if you're going to blow it out, that's the play. Yeah.

You know what I mean? And he threw some pizzazz on it. I just, the more and more he did it, even when he went into the cameras, he didn't really go gingerly. No, you're right. Early in the first quarter, he looked like he was,

he grimaced a little bit, and I thought, oh, he's, it's bothering him, but he didn't, it didn't maintain that way. He looked much better. It looked like he warmed up to it. I don't know if he just adjusted to the pain

or, again, whatever, Indiana, whatever y'all are doing over there in that training room. Like, just write a book, whatever you got to do, send it out to the rest of the league because that's what guys need. Like whatever his relationship is with that training staff, whatever he's doing at home, that's being a professional, making sure that you can show up for your team.

He said before the game, he was like, I had some very hard conversations with, I mean, he didn't say who, but I assume the training staff, the team doctors, like, you know, you could play on this and risk it. But he, you know, he may have sound like it was not an easy decision. But then he came out here and... You didn't play like it was. He played unafraid. He did.

And it's encouraging to see that if you're going into a game seven. He gets two more days off to rest it. And this is the effect of both teams, right? Where it's like after each game that somebody wins, it's hard to see the other team bouncing back and then they bounce back. Game seven, this might be the best ball game. of the series. Well, it has to be, but.

So let me ask you this before we talk any more about the game. You were part of a team that won a huge, that won game six at home. Nine years ago, this week, well, nine years ago today was game seven. But you guys won in 2016, you won game six really big. And you went back on the road. What was the mindset after you guys won game six? The pressure that was going to be in their mind. especially them having us down 3-1, they knew there's no reason for them to even be close right now.

When you start doing that, we call it the mental warfare of the game, when that creeps in, and they had to also play that one game without Draymond Green. We just knew their mental was all over the place. They knew how much pressure they had on themselves to win on their home court. And by that time, we were so lax because we had already played back against the wall. Nobody thinks we have a shot in this series. If I'm Indiana, this is the best situation you could be in because we counted you out.

A lot of people counted you out. You were the underdogs in the series the whole time. Y'all have now faced elimination. Y'all have had every version of basketball thrown at you and you've survived it. You had a key injury to a key guy now. You can't say they haven't been through the ringer. They've been through plenty.

Right. And, you know, now they're face. And like, this is going to be a hell of a run to talk about if they finished this. So on one hand, the Thunder had this situation, second round versus Denver. They had a, it wasn't lopsided, but they had a sort of a convincing loss in Denver. They came back home, get the win at home. But I just want to point out that Indiana last year went on the road to Madison Square Garden and beat the Knicks. Now, in that game, Jalen Brunson broke his hand.

And the Knicks were really wounded and worn out. And the Knicks are not the Thunder. But it's not, you know, this Indiana team. First off, they've been very good on the road throughout the last two years in the playoffs. Very good on the road in this year's playoffs. And they've won game seven on the road. This group has won game seven on the road. So I think both teams can get on the plane thinking they know what needs to be done.

Yeah. Pascal Seacom too. I know that they took him out so he didn't get to run those numbers up as he would have gotten to in a regular season game or another playoff game. He had 13 rebounds, 16 points of 13 rebounds. Exactly, but usually at the end of games

you finish out with a good 22, 24 because you're shooting free throws, you're still playing. They did their job so early he got to take a rest. What's the other thing, by the way, real quick. Halliburton only played 23 minutes. Unbelievable. More Hoop Collective Podcast, after this. But again, I saw what they were doing. They left him out there longer than we thought,

though. I thought it would be way quicker bursts than it was. He played a couple eight-minute stretches that I was like, I wouldn't have left him. But again, the way he was moving had to be convincing if you Rick Carlisle. Well, he said before the game, there's no limitations. You know, on one hand, you're like, well, yeah, there's no limitations because it's, you know, elimination game. On the other hand, they must have watched him move and thought he looked good. Yeah, I've, again, Zairis Halliburton. Hell of a professional. Not sure what y'all are doing over there in that locker room.

But to be ready to play in this game, to send that message to your team that if I'm going to be y'all leader, you can bet that I'm going to spill all the blood I got to spill. Who wouldn't play for him at this point? And that's what I think you saw. I think you saw a team rally behind their guy knowing he's wounded, but saying we're not going to stop. T.J. McConnell, again, my hat goes off to him. You are playing your ass off.

He had four steals tonight. In fact, I should bring out, you know, we were free. out the other night because the Thunderhead 27 stocks, steals and blocks. But what was even better, we keep saying this thing where we're like, you know, you don't come in here and don't try and play outside yourself. T.J. McCompson did something that he doesn't normally do. It's usually Tyrese Halliburton with the nine rebounds. He went out there and grabbed nine rebounds.

He did. He said, you know what? Y'all get one shot and then we go on. That's right. He had nine rebounds, but he had four steals and six assists. But anyway, we talked the other day. about 27 blocks and steals for OKC, 21 blocks and steals for Indiana tonight. That's incredible effort and energy defensively.

And frankly, the Thunder were just letting them take the ball from them. They look like they were on their heels. After the first few minutes, they looked like they were on their heels offensively. They were just, you know. I think this is the one time. She was laying, I mean, this was Shea playing for a championship and he was just letting the ball being taken from them. This is the gift and the curse of Shea. Even when we were talking to Coach Cal,

previously, I can't remember what game that was, but. His coach at Kentucky. His coach at Kentucky. Talking to Coach Cal, he was just being very informative of that even kill thing is win, lose, or draw. It's in the classroom. It's when he goes to talk to his mom after the game or his father after the game.

It's a consistent thing. And when I see it in a game like this, sometimes you need somebody to go for the kill. You know what I mean? So to speak. And I don't think they had that tonight. I think that that even kill might have came to shoot them in the foot today. So what you're saying is, you know, and the whole team plays this way mostly. But he's the guy who sets the tone.

It just trickles down. You don't, you, you, they acted like this was another playoff game, not a chance to win the title. It reminded me of that interview he did, right? Where he's just like, you know, we just got to approach it like another game. Like, I don't think y'all took, I think they took for granted the magnitude of Indiana feeling like we just need to get through this. If we can weather this storm, like, we know our guy will be ready for game seven. Like, we just need to weather this storm. and now seeing that Indiana plays like a group of desperate men.

I used to, I had a coach in college, Charleston Young, that Coach C.Y, we call him Coach C. Y. But he used to always say, Grievous Vasquez played like a desperate man. And that the only way I could beat him was to wait until the end of the game and then play desperate with him. And when you start talking about that level of desperation, you saw it. what, one through nine, one through 10 for Indiana. And then you watch it trickle down on the other side. Like, we're going to stay chill. Nobody panic.

Let's stay chill. And you saw that lead stretch out a little bit more, a little bit more. I think at some point, Shea's going to have to deliver some sort of emotion to his bench and his locker room and let them know, this is real. Like, I know I'm the cool, chill guy, but I need y'all to understand we cannot lose this game. Tim Bond.

Tom's always he is his mic on it is how about that right uh hello mr bond tembs chan hello just coming back from the locker room in the press conferences yeah shump was talking about he jumped just made it well i'll listen to what they said but chum made a good point that you know the thunder's sort of nature shee sort of nature of like just be chill and be even keel may not have served them necessarily well in it in the emotions that they needed to play for a championship but yeah yeah i mean chump would know a lot better than me about that. I just thought that they just got demolished. It was one of those games. I just

thought it was remarkable the way that the paces were able to just completely dictate the game from the beginning. And I think the craziest thing about the way these games in India have gone is I was looking at the stats during the game. Chegos Alexander had never had more than five turnovers in a playoff game before this series. In game

three here, loss. He had six. Tonight, a loss. He had eight. Like, Chegoeos, Alexander, having eight turnovers in a game is crazy. It's tied for the most turnovers in a finals game, I think, in 40 years or something like that. Yeah, it's just like for that to happen is just really wild. And like I thought we could see a lot of different versions of the game today. I did not think we would see this. More hoop collective podcast after this. I mean, what,

Chump, I don't know if you guys talked about it, but do you, is it, when you lose a game like this, like is it easier to sort of wipe it off and go to game seven than if it was a game like game one where you let a lead go later, you have it go down to the last, shot with a chance to win the title or is it in all mine in all mine this game six was taken so i would say i would say that when you see a team playing how indiana's playing and you're okay see if it's not going to be shay somebody has to deliver the message that the even kill thing i know we usually do that today ain't the day yeah like slam a water bottle somebody has to inject something into everybody's chest to let them know.

Don't let them get to game seven because game seven is, I don't know what it is, it's just a magical game. Well, you know what happened the last time there was a game seven in the NBA finals show. I don't, I got to tell you. You were in the building for that. I don't like that. Right there.

That's what happened. Right there. Some shiny happens. It's just, I don't know what it is about game seven. It's like. Road team, Ro team did pretty well in that game in a crazy environment. against an all-time great team.

Historically, game sevens have gone heavily to the home team, except for the last, like, decade. In the last decade, road teams are basically 500 in game sevens. I'm not sure why that's happening. The other thing is I really don't want to deal with Indiana in a game seven. This particular team. Especially when I had them down. When I had them down, I had them even early on,

because they were at about 30, what was it, 31, 33, I believe it was, 31, 33, something like that. When you feel the game first starts slipping, I thought that Jaila Williams, I think he showed his age today. Just, you know what I'm saying? Like we expect, especially coming off that 40-point game, you expect him to know how to just pack people up all the time now. And you also expect him to do that next to an MVP that demands the ball,

demands touches. and today was one of them, he was in no man's land. He wasn't really playing particularly well. SGA didn't really play particularly well. They were on their back. They were just on the back foot the whole game. Yeah. Like they have the first four minutes of the game.

They're up 10 to 2. They're flying around. Chet's getting to the rim. Jane Williams dunk in the ball. Carlisle's calling time out, right? It was then like 78 to 40 or 68 to 30 over the next three and two and a half quarter. It was just.

It's an absolute demolition. I felt like they started taking out of rhythm three-pointers. Like they were just taking three-pointers. They were out of rhythm with everything. They were losing. They had five turnovers in the first quarter. They were losing the ball. They weren't getting into offense.

Like they just completely fell apart. First help. Second help. Rotation. Sending a man to the weak side corner. Indiana did it all today. Their defense looked a lot like OKC's defense. They all mirrored the ball.

And when I say mirror the ball, that's a pass gets made. to the top of the key. You're watching five guys close out toward it and then take two steps back toward their man. Seeing that over and over and over, you already know in your mind, there's no driving lane available. So you're going to catch it in your triple threat and survey rather than catch it and go for a quick blow by. I just felt like, like you said, okay, C was on their heels. They usually have their foot on the gas. They did not do it at all today. So, yeah, so there was an 11 between the end of the second quarter and into the third quarter because

They didn't score for the first, OKC didn't score for the first five minutes of the third quarter. There was 11 possessions where they did not score between the second quarter and the third. They went 0 of 10 in that stretch with a couple of turnovers. They went 0 of 5 on threes. And that's where the game was totally lost. When OB Top and start going nuts. Well, how about the signature play from this game was the no look pass? And the dunk on jail?

Yeah, at the end of the first half. Yeah. Dunked basically and put Jalen Williams on the floor. Huge game from Pascal. That was the moment. Unbrew. Another big game of course is Pascal. Yeah, no look pass.

But that's what I meant about just that home crowd getting behind. That's all you need. You need one of those plays. And he gave us a couple of threes. I told you I just needed two threes and a pass, something like that. Going into a timeout, the fade out on ESPN, screaming to the crowd a little bit. Yeah, I mean, everything.

They had two buzzer beers tonight. Oh, my Lord. Yeah, I mean, look, and to your point about the game seven. With the mustache. Yeah. I saw the mustache celebration. Yeah. I mean, to your point about the game seven, Brian, the problem that the Thunder, like, look,

the Thunder obviously have dominated the games in OKC. They've had 141 to 144 minutes there. The Pacers have largely dominated the games here. Both teams got kind of a cheap win on the other team's court. Not cheap, but they come back win. Well, but I'm saying the Pacers dominated game four in law. lost. The Thunder dominated game won and lost. And that's why it's not three three for the home team so far. Right. So if you're okay, see you go home. You feel good about that. Hey, we're going to be in our home environment. Our defense is going to be revved up. To your point, it might be kind of a flat team. But the energy in that place is unbelievable. That'll lift them up, right? The defense will get going. But the paces are a team that can hit a ton of threes. And the thunder are a team that can get really, really cold from three. And if they're other guys are not hitting three, a lot of the time it's just Jalen Williams and Shea Hedges-Alexander and not a lot else.

If you get in one game like this, you have some guys get hot, Obie Toppin gets hot, McConnell does this thing. All of a sudden, you could be in a situation where you're down 10 in the third quarter and you're trying to manufacture offense and there might not be enough there. So, you know, it's to your point about these Pacers, Brian, they have been a team that's made everybody uncomfortable all playoffs. They did it today and, you know, it certainly wouldn't be surprising if they won't do it again on. It's actually hard to say they won't do it again, especially when you went in there listening to anything, did they say anything? I mean, I wanted to hear what Mark Dagnall had to say. And I mean, it was exactly what you would expect. I mean, you know, we didn't the we had an uncharacteristic game.

Pacers took it to us. Not much to say about it. Everybody was bad. I mean, the thunder are who they are in every way, right? They're going to say it's no big deal. It's one game. We're going to come back. They're not going to blow up.

To your point. whether you want them to go smash stuff around or not, they're just not going to do that. They're going to do their business. They're going to get on the plane. They're going to go home. They're going to start working. And they're going to show up on Sunday.

And, you know, it wasn't like anybody who's going to come in and say anything otherwise. But, you know, they have been made to feel a lot more uncomfortable than I ever thought the Pacers could do to them in this series. And like I said, those turnovers from Shea, I think are just the most emblematic thing. For a guy who's always taking care of the ball, the Pacers have done a remarkable job of getting him. off kilter in these games in okayc. What, look, you were a great defensive player. What do you think they've done that's caused him so much trouble? I don't think that they did as much to cause him trouble in this game that they did in other games, right?

But I think that this game, especially when it started trying to get out of reach, I think Shay searched for the foul. Yeah. Like. Which you'll do sometimes. Without a doubt. But he usually does it after he's got a rhythm. This was the first time he was using the foul to get a rhythm.

And that's why I brought up James Hart. There's times that I see James get in trouble when it comes to the playoffs because he'll start the game too early where you're playing the game for fouls. And you're not getting as many of those calls. You're not going to get as many of those calls, but unless you're cooking in the playoffs, they're not going to stop the show. Right. Like, we're not, the show is going to go on. But if you're cooking, then you're more lenient to that whistle. I don't think SGA ever got cooking.

So it was tough for the whistle to even get blown for him. What do we think is going to happen in game seven, Shep? We got, Chuck. You're doing with the ring. Honestly, man, I'm more focused on, Indiana, I'm more focused on going home to get some more clothes. I got to wear a full suit to elimination game. I didn't think.

You brought the eight. I did not think. I didn't think this was going seven. Especially with Tyrese being questionable. Again, hats off to him, being a professional, making sure he's getting enough rest, treatment, making sure that he's communicating with his doctors and his training staff to make sure that he can go.

Hats off to T.J. McConnell, O.B. Topping. Like, I didn't expect y'all to come. If I expected a win, I didn't expect that type of win. That was very convincing. That showed a lot of pride. That showed a lot to y'all city. And you guys should feel really good going into Game 7. The game's up for grabs.

I still would have to say OKC just because historically. Don't be right. They historically don't lose twice in a row. OKCCC's been favorite every game. They're at home, though. Of course they're going to be favored. You know, I would just say this. The Pacers didn't shoot the ball hot tonight.

They had a few stretches where they made some shots, but they didn't shoot the ball hot. They shot 41%. They shot, and when they went to garbage time, they were shooting like 41%. It's amazing. So they, you know, they can still shoot hot. That's what I would say. It's amazing. You look at these stats and I, I,

I know that OKC plays well at home. I just, Indiana just finds so many ways to make themselves dangerous. And it's, I was joking around earlier every time Jalen Williams caught the ball and saying that was the danger. But seeing Tyrese Halliburton not hovel on that foot continue to play like that,

even though we're thinking in our minds, that's gone. that'll be gone for the game. And then seeing these other guys step in and play as if he's not on the court, I'm not one to downplay mental warfare. That would bother me. You know what I mean? We are going to see how tough OKC is mentally

because facing a game seven, which are back to the wall at home. Yeah. If I was, I don't know what they'll say publicly, but somebody in the locker need to say something because their mental approach to this game was not acceptable. I mean, look, I mean, look, I'm not going to go that far. I mean, they, come on. Listen, I'm not going to say the mental approach.

They keep saying it's another game. Well, listen, they played an awful game and they got smoked. If they lose at home in game seven and they lose the season. Then you're going to say that the mentality needs to change. Well, I mean, then we can look back on how it went. They were trying to win championships. I mean, I understand that. They played horribly today.

I'm not going to say they were good. I just like, look, I always think when you say things like the mental approach isn't right. It's like people approach it the same way. be different on Sunday, but tonight they were, it was not. Yeah, they got absolutely demolished. The Pacers, the Pacers took them out of their game from the beginning and they, they killed them. I mean, look, as far as me, I think Thunder are winning game seven.

This, like I said earlier, the home team in this series has dominated just about every game. The Thunder have been far, far better than the Pacers in OKC. The Pacers have not really looked like they could do much of anything. They had a couple late comebacks to make the games tight in a couple of them, but it wasn't, it wasn't like either one of them you felt like the Thunder had done anything but take full of control of the game. And look, the Thunder have the best player. He has stepped up in every spot.

That's exactly true. This series has completely mirrored the Denver series. In each game, it's gone exactly the same. Giveaway game one, dominate game two, lose game three, all the way through. Game seven against Nicole Yokic, the best player on the planet. The Thunder went out and won by a million points. And yes, Aaron Gordon was hurt. Yes, all that stuff.

But I think they're going to take care of business on some. All right. We got to wrap up. I'm sorry. I just want to say before we get all. Plus their bench didn't play well at all. We're not used to O'KC's bench doing nothing like that. It was terrible.

Thank you to Bontem's, thank you to Shumpert. Thank you to our producers. Thank you for watching. Listen to Hump Collective. We'll talk to you before games up. We'll see you at Oak Room. Oh.