PTI - Are the Thunder Champions in Waiting?

Episode Date: May 29, 2025

Michael Wilbon and Tony Kornheiser discuss the latest in the NBA and NHL. Plus, P.K. Subban joins the show! 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. Pardon the interruption, but I'm Mike Wilburne. Tony, Washington, D.C.'s oldest resident, Willie Mae Avery, just turned 110. Tony Kornheiser.

She was two years above me in high school. I remember her well. I think she was one of cheerleader. I think. I'm not sure. Football. I'm going back. Born in 1915.

I mean, that's, you know. 110. It's a long time. That's really. Really, it's a long time, 100th. I'm close, so I don't know that I want to get there, though. It's a long time. Welcome to PTI, boys and girls.

In today's episode, the Knicks try to stay alive. The Panthers make it back to the Stanley Cup final, and BK.C. Suban joins us for five good minutes. But we begin today with the Oklahoma City Thunder, overwhelming Minnesota right from the start last night, building a 30-point lead in the second quarter, and cruising to a series-ending win. The Thunder of the second youngest team ever to reach the NBA final.

behind only the 1977 Bill Walton Trailblazers. Wilbon, what do you see when you watch the Thunder? I see a team, Tony, that looks damn near like a championship team. I mean, I know they've got to finish it, and you don't want to take anything for granted. That would be completely arrogant if they felt that way. And they're going to have the Pacers or Knicks. Seems like the Pacers next. A worthy opponent, but Oklahoma City looks formidable.

They are dominant at times to hold, you know, the Timberwills to last year's conference finalists to nine points in the first quarter. And it's the way they're doing it. They are smothering them with defense. They're basically daring Minnesota to do the things that Minnesota has done somewhat successfully the last two years. Daring Anthony Edwards, daring Julius Randall. And it's working. It's bold. It's creative.

it's flexing, and you look at them, and you just go, okay, we need to move on now to the next thing. And, of course, we are moving on to the next thing. But, Tony, I've been around long enough to have been around some young championship teams that featured the likes of Kobe and Shaq, you know, and Steph and Clay and Draymond. I've been around them at the beginning. This, to me, is resembling that. And things can unravel it. an injury, you know, contract squabbling. Things can happen.

But right now, where we sit coming off last night, that's what it resembles to me. Yeah, this comes as no surprise to me at all. They've been a monster at home all season. They were 35 and 6 at home in the regular season, 8 and 1 at home during the playoffs. You know, they got beat pretty bad in game three, right, by Minnesota. And they came back right away, and they won game four in game five with any problem. And as you say, they held Minnesota, nine points is a joke in the NBA in a conference finals. Nine points in the first quarter. What are we talking about here? They won

19, they're better than Minnesota. They won 19 more games at a regular season than Minnesota. And I know how much you love Anthony Edwards. But he had another, and I stress another lackluster game last night. He had 19 points. That's eight below his season average. In three of these games, he's been in the teens. He's their best player. You can't score in the teens. He was was one of seven for three. In Minnesota's four losses from three, he is six of 31. That's 19%. Afterwards, Edward said nobody was going to outwork him next year. And I thought to myself, I don't really know what when you're talking about. Nobody said you didn't work hard. They're a better team. And they figured out how to defend you. They figured it out. I mean, they're good.

You're right. That's a great point about the work. He's going to have to have organizational help He's going to have to have some realizations. At 23, there's time to do that. But Oklahoma City, he better be careful. He and everybody else, because they can lap you. If you don't get it together and somebody wins a championship and really starts to explore how great they can be, other folks, Minnesota, can be in trouble.

I'll just say this very quickly. I'm going to give credit to Minnesota. They made a big trade. They still got back to the conference finals. But they need something more. And you know who's out there. Kevin Durant's out there. Kevin Durant could get them to the top.

Good point. Let's go to the one remaining NBA series. The Pacers in the Knicks tonight, and Wilbon, you are in New York for this. The Pacers lead the series 3 to 1. They've won both games in Madison Square Garden. Carl Anthony Towns has a left knee contusion. He is questionable for tonight's game.

Towns' New York's second leading playoff score is averaging 26 in the series. Wilbon, do you like the Knicks' chances of forcing a game six? Tony Les, when I look on the screen and see Carl Anthony Towns limping like that, and all credit to Carl Anthony Towns for getting back up and staying on the court in game four, and you know he's going to try to play tonight. He's going to go out there. But Tony, they're having enough trouble when whole and relatively healthy keeping up with Indiana.

As a matter of fact, they can't really keep up. It's like it's a track meeting. They're out there against Usain Bolt. and then if Carl Anthony Towns is limping, I mean, the Knicks are already vulnerable defensively. And if he is not at his best, whatever that is, they're going to be really in trouble defensively. So he's their second best player,

a second most important player all the way around. You know, I want to see the Knicks, you know, extend this series. I love the conference playoffs. I'd like to see more basketball. But the way the Pacers are going, it's hard to really see the Knicks putting together the kind of effort that's going to extend this series. This is a different Michael Ray Wilbon than I saw a couple of weeks ago. When you first got to New York City, you were so excited. You were all around the basketball.

Everything you heard, everything you saw was about the Knicks. And you felt that energy from the Knicks. I know that I said on this show yesterday that there were four series remaining in hockey and basketball. and I thought only one of them could get to a game six. And I thought it was the Knicks could force that to happen. And I still think that, but I have eyes. I have seen the playoffs to this point. Indiana is better just by a little, but they've been better in the same way that Tyrese Halliburton has been a little better than Jalen Brunson.

There's some numbers here to run. Indiana has won six straight playoff games in a row on the road. This game is on the road. They're 13 and 3 overall in the playoffs. The only game they ever lose is game 3. This is game 5. So like I say, I'd love to see the Knicks win, but intellectually, I sort of feel that it's Indiana's series at this point.

I will differ from you in this regard. If somebody said, why would you like the Knicks? I would say Jalen Brunson, because he's really tough and he's fearless. And they would say, well, Carl Anthony Towns might not play or may be diminished. That's going to hurt them. And I would say, I'm not so sure about that. because if you put all the pressure on Brunson, I think he might respond.

The one bet I would make tonight is that Thibodeau will play Brunson 44 to 45 minutes, if not more than that. If not more than that. Yeah, but Tony, I just worried that they're worn out. I hear you, because we've got those plus-minus numbers that suggest you can do the Knicks do better with one or the other off the court.

I don't think that's going to apply, but we'll see shortly. Okay. I had hope for the hurricanes last night, too. They jumped out to a 2-0-0 lead in the Panthers. You know, I had the remote in my hand. I clicked away. I clicked over to the basketball.

And when I checked back, about four minutes later, they were down 3-2 en route to a 5-3 loss. Florida now returns to the Stanley Cup final for the third consecutive season. The defending champs reacted like they won a mid-season game. Tony, what do you make of how the Panthers won and how little they marked the achievement. You and I had this conversation earlier today.

Like you, I was watching on television. Then it was 1-0-0-0-0, Carolina. Then it was 2-0-0-0. And Carolina was playing at home, and I said to myself, ooh, you went out on television, and you picked Florida. You look like a dope.

But then I remembered what our friend, Bernie Wolf, the goalie had said, that the most dangerous lead to have in hockey is a 2-0-0-0. And then I went to the basketball, and I came back, like you, It was three to two at that point. You know, I felt that I could exhale

and I could stop writing my note of apology. Look, how did they win this? Florida won this honestly like champions. They were down 2-0 on the road to a team that was 6-0 when it had scored the first goal in the playoffs. You come back on that one, Mike. That has the pedigree of a champion

as far as I'm concerned. Florida now, 23 and 10 on the road. in the last three playoff seasons. And not coincidentally, they're in the Stanley Cup for the third straight time. They beat Carolina in these games 21-10. Again, third straight time. This is odd to me.

Because there was a run like this recently. Tampa Bay made it. In the last six years, there's always been a Florida team. A Florida man. But a Florida team in the Stanley Cup final. How do you explain that? How do you explain that from a warm weather site? Well, Florida and Carolina, I mean, they're just all over the Stanley Cup conference finals and final.

And I, look, Tony, we're talking about, you know, two dominant performances last night, even though, you know, 5'3 may not sound dominant. As you just said, it was dominant, what Florida did, being down two goals on the road in that game. They are where Oklahoma City seems to be entering. There's a door that says champion over the Florida Panthers. And, you know, the thunder seems to be wanting to just walk right through that to get to the point where they can flex like this too. Kick it down.

By Tom Phillips said. Just going to knock you out. Yeah. Impressive. Just for 10 seconds, they didn't celebrate at all. Why exactly would they celebrate? This is a stop along the way for them. This is a staging area.

They don't care about this. trophy. They didn't touch it. They want the other trophy. Don't touch it. Let's take a break. Coming up, where are these Panthers vulnerable? We're going to ask P.K. Sue Ban. We're also going to ask him how the Oilers might be impacted by the loss

of Zach Hyman. I was two for two last night, Wilma. But I was sweated out the hockey. Sweated out the hockey. It was two nothing. I was ready to start hugging and kissing Carolina. Not so fast.

basketball was like 197 after the first four. Let's dig back into the Stanley Cup playoffs with our great friend ESPN hockey analyst, P.K. Subbin. Let's start with this. The Florida Panthers looked absolutely dominant against the hurricanes. But tell me, where exactly are they vulnerable? Where they're vulnerable right now is the fact that they're going to their third Stanley Cup final. You have to think that they're a little bit tired and worn down, but this team doesn't look like they're slowing down. Honestly, it doesn't look like their energies anywhere,

but where it needs to be going into the Stanley Cup final. They look like the best team in the league and Stanley Cup champions. You want to ask me where their weaknesses, go through their defense. Maybe you see one there. In net, you ain't seeing one there, and you definitely not see one up front. And in every category, every facet of the game of hockey, you heard Rod Brindamor say it, this team is the standard now in the National Hockey League. So I don't see a weakness right now with the Florida Panthers.

Wow. P.K., that leads me to wonder this. Do you think this team is as good as the team that won it all last year? Better? I mean, how do they compare in your mind? You know, at the beginning of the year, I said to myself, there's no way the Florida... How are they going to get better? How are they going to keep all of these guys? And, you know, they let a couple guys go, some depth players.

You know, Stenland and, you know, Lamborghini, Lombardini there on the fourth line. But they go and get a guy like Brad Marshawn. People want to say he's aging. Does Brad Marshawn look like he's aged? I'm sorry. At times, he's looked like the Florida Panthers best player. He's playing on their third line, guys. So, you know, you look at Seth Jones.

An upgrade from Oliver Ekman-Larsin, of course, because of his age. The fact that he can lug minutes, he looks like a new player out there. So I have to say the Florida Panthers are in a better position than they were last year. Lusterin is a year older. Lundell's a year older. Barkov is healthy. Matthew Kachuk now, who missed most of the season. is healthy. They're in a better position.

And Bobrovsky, when is he going to slow down? He's still bobbing and weaving. So I think the Florida Panthers are in a better position than they were last year going into Stanley Cup. And by the way, they get that series done in five games. So they get some time to rest. Unbelievable job. Well, Oilers are hoping to do that as well. Oilers stars tonight game five.

What exactly does Ebenton lose with the absence of Zach Hyman, PK? A leader in the locker room and a physicality on the ice. We can talk about him being a 50 goal score and what he brings to their power play, but they got guys that can put the puck in the net. It's the physicality and the leadership and the experience for me. This is a huge loss to the Edmonton Oilers. It could be a critical loss when it's all said and done. Wow.

So then you're leaving open the possibility that they could even lose this series. That's interesting. They've outscored the stars 13 to 2 since they lost game one. it appears to have been lopsided. Maybe this changes things, but to this point, why has it been so lopsided? Well, the Edmonton, the Edmonton Oilers' best players have been the best players in the series. Not the best players on their team, the best players in the series. That's a problem for Dallas.

Dallas, you can put all the X's and O's as you want together, but you bet when the bright lights come on, ESPN, we spend all this money on marketing about how big the moment is. The players got to get the memo. I don't know. Randon's got to show up tonight. Ropey Hintz has to have an impact. Hayskinen has to have an impact. He's got his feet wet now. I know he's been injured for a long time. Jamie Ben has to have an impact.

We have to see him out there tonight. All those players, your seasons on the line, you're against the league's best player. And right now a team that's trying to get back to the Stanley Cup again, they're going to need their best players to be their best players tonight. They have not been good enough.

They haven't played to their strengths. They haven't been willing to go to the dirty areas enough and do that consistently. You got to grind Edmonton down. They haven't done that job this series. All right. Before we let you go, we go off-road a little bit.

I know you're going to be keeping one eye on game five in Madison Square Garden tonight. Who you got? The Knicks extending this thing or the Pacers ending it? Listen to me right now, I got Knicks. I've been saying Knicks did six.

I got the Knicks winning tonight. Definitely. I think this is time. Their big players got to show up. I don't like Indiana. I don't like the look of their team. I don't like the smell of their players when I walk by in the garden. I'm a Nix. Listen to me, Knicks, let's go.

Jim Dahl and the whole crew, buckle up and strap in. It'll be rocking tonight. I got the Knicks winning tonight. Let's go. There we go. Thank you, P.K. Thank you. Appreciate it.

Thanks, guys. You can catch more P.K. tonight during the game and starting with the point at 7.30 Eastern. Wilbon, of course, thinks he'll only have one eye on his actual job, but I don't think so. I think he'll have both. Let's take one last break still to come. The president of the NCAA indicates that the expansion of March Madness is a top priority. That's dumb.

Joe Flackle explains his issue with mentoring the Brown's two rookie quarterbacks. Is Joe Flacco still in the league, or is he in some AARP location undisclosed? He's not only still in the league, he's actually effective. Happy time, people. Happy 23rd birthday Paul Schemes. The overall number one pick in the 2003 baseball draft on a national champion LSU was a huge and immediate success last year with the Pirates. Skeen started the All-Star game, was National League rookie of the year. He was 113 with a 196-ERA, 170 strikeouts, and 133 innings.

This season, Skeens is just 4 and 5, but he pitched 6 and 2-thirds scoreless last night, and he won. His ERA is 2-1-5, and he routinely throws pitches 100 miles an hour. Skeens recently pitched that rare complete game, but it was eight innings because it was a one-nothing loss. Pittsburgh is a perpetually bad team. You wonder how long Skeens will be happy there or if he will want to leave? You think he's going to be on the Barry Bonds plan

that he's going to be out of there sometime soon and have the greatest years of his career somewhere else? That would be kind of sad for Pittsburgh. They're great sports fans there. I'd be sad to see that. Happy anniversary, Larry Bird, on this day, 45 years ago, the Celtics superstar won the NBA's Rookie of the Year award after averaging 21 points,

10 rebounds, 5 assists. Bird beat out his great rival, Magic Johnson, who went 18, 7 and 8. Magic, of course, got the last laugh by winning the NBA title over Philly, just as his Michigan State team had beaten Byrd's Indiana State team for the NCAA championship the year before. Byrd's presence on the Celtics helped them go from 29 wins to 61 wins. And this was before, Mike, before Parrish and Mikhail got to Boston. Yeah.

We will watch now to see if Cooper Flagg, a similar kind of player to Byrd, will improve Dallas like that. Cornbread, Maxwell, Tiny, Archibald, even Dave Cowens was on that team. Tony, if that is true, if Cooper Flagg can do that, then the Dallas Mavericks will indeed get over the loss of Luca Donchage. If he's that good. And he's playing with guys who can play. You know, especially if they get Kyrie back and Anthony Davis is out there,

70 games or so, then that the Covern ain't bear in Dallas. But if they do that, leave Nico alone. Free Nico. Nico didn't have much to do with the ping pong balls. Come on now. Happy trails to active mentoring for Joe Flacco. Flacco finds himself competing with rookies Dylan Gabriel and Shadour Sanders, along with fourth-year-man Kenny Pickett for the Brown starting quarterback job.

But the 40-year-old veteran says he prioritizes his own performance, telling reporters, quote, If I say I don't want to be a mentor, I look bad. If I say I do want to be a mentor, I look like an idiot. It doesn't care about being good and playing football. The best way to be a mentor, honestly, is to show people how you go to work. Well, the question is, they're going to need him. Are they going to need him this year?

One of the young bucks going to win that position. How soon do we see Shador Sanders under center? That's what most of us care about. No disrespect to Mr. Flacco, who's had a distinguished career. He has. He's won the Super Bowl. Let's go to the big finish. NCAA President Charlie Baker says one of his top priorities is to expand March Madness. Your reaction? No. Leave March Madness alone. Don't people ever just see something that's a masterpiece and not mess with it? The Washington Capitol say they mistakenly emailed season ticket holders calling next season Alex Oveskins last.

Your thoughts, Mr. D.C. My thoughts are they did it deliberately to scare people into buying tickets for this year. Of course they did. The Rockies have lost five straight. They're now nine and 47. How do you feel about that? Well, the last three of those came here really feel. They were not beat downs like they should have been.

It worries me about the Cubs' bats, but I'm fine with their last three losses. Longtime Patriots Center, David Andrews, is calling it a career. How are you going to remember it? He was undrafted. He got to play and win two Super Bowls. got the snap to Tom Brady, which I'm sure was a lot more fun than the last few years. He had a great career. Last one, Novak Djokovic, advanced to the third round in straight sets, despite a blister on his left big toe.

I'll bet you're impressed. Oh, yeah. And sinners, Verif, Cocoa, Keyes, Pagula. They all advanced, too, impressed with all of it. Glad they're in the field still. We're out of time. Try to do better the next time. I'm Tony Cornynheuser.

And I'm Mike Wilbon. Same time tomorrow, knuckleheads. You can get the podcast on the app. or Apple Podcast. Time to go to the garden, Tony. Yeah, enjoy the game. Enjoy the game. The atmosphere will be great.

I'm still excited.