The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Hoops Tonight - Luka Doncic got 60, LeBron triple-double in Lakers W + Wemby's game-winner for Spurs | NBA Reaction

Episode Date: March 23, 2026

Jason reacts to the Los Angeles Lakers getting an impressive win over the Miami Heat, including Luka Doncic scoring 60 points and LeBron James getting a triple-double. Then he breaks down Victor Wembanyama's game-winner for the San Antonio Spurs against the Phoenix Suns. All lines presented by Hard Rock Bet.  #VolumeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Hey, guys, it's us. The Jonas Brothers. I'm Joe. I'm Kevin. And I'm Nick. And guess what? We created our own podcast called, Hey, Jonas.

We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. We get to ask other people questions because we're sick and tired of being asked questions. Well, sick and tired is a strong way to put it. But, you know, tired and sick. Tired and sick.

Listen to Hey, Jonas, on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you. you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the ice.

Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, fam? It's Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano. It's our favorite time of the year on our podcast, Point Game, the playoffs. We're digging into the biggest surprises of the season. And I'm looking back on some of my greatest playoff moments. If we didn't talk ever again, I was crying.

You just understood. That's how personal it got. Wow. Then after that game seven, Marquis' keep coming to you. He's like, you know, I love you, dog. You know, it's all love. This was just playoffs. This was just basketball.

So listen to Point Game on the, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life? That is not the look of an innocent man. Is everyone lying to me about who they are? I felt such desperation. I felt it was what I had to do.

Listen to deep cover the family man. on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Volume. Welcome to Hoops tonight here at The Volume. Happy Friday, everybody. Hope all you guys are having a great end to your week. Got a jam-pack show for you guys today. We ended up getting a couple of incredible games last night out of the Los Angeles Lakers

versus the Miami Heat and the Phoenix Suns versus the San Antonio Spurs, a potential first-round playoff preview out in the Western Conference. We're just going to be doing breakdowns of each of those two games. You guys know the drill before we get started. to the Hoops Tonight YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of our videos. Make sure you like this video and sign up for post notifications. That helps us a lot. And then last but at least,

if you want to get mailbag questions into our future mailbags, drop them into our YouTube comments and we'll get to them throughout the rest of the season. All right, let's talk some basketball. So as the Lakers go into Miami last night, first and foremost, I respected the hell out of those guys in that locker room just for going for that game. It was their 11th game in the month in the month of March. 11 games in 19 days. Not only that, of those 11 games,

seven of them were against pretty high-level playoff teams. And they didn't land in Miami in that back-to-back yesterday until 5 a.m. on the day of the game. And we all saw how physical and intense those games against Houston were. We also all know the way Miami likes to play. Full court pressure, mixing in traps,

the crazy pace on offense. It's a game you have to. to run a ton. My feet were literally hurting just watching the game. And they absolutely could have punted that game and still kept the inside track on the three seat in the Western Conference. I said this the other day, but given those two games, it was way more important for them to beat Houston and potentially lose to Miami than to beat Miami and lose to Houston because of the way of the tiebreakers work. They absolutely could have been like, look, guys, let's give it a rest. We'll get the rest of the games on this road trip with more intensity. Let's take care of

of our bodies, but they went for it because they wanted to. They wanted to win that game. They wanted to keep their street going. And I just thought it was one of those moments, the latest in a long line of moments that demonstrated the basketball character of this group and really a remarkable turnaround that this group has manifested here over the last three or four weeks. You could tell they were exhausted right away. They went down 9-0 immediately in the first two minutes. They were leaving jump shots short. Austin especially looked like the guy that stuck out like a sore thumb as exhausted last night, especially down the stretch, down the tail end of that game. Miami went one on one at Austin over and over and over again and scored, especially Tyler

Harrow and Davion Mitchell. But he gave him, he brought in 18 points, just found little ways to help the team on offense throughout the game. He had a couple of huge buckets in that second half. And we've talked about this already this week. Like the next step for all. and his development is conditioning. Not that he's in bad shape or anything like that, but there's definitely another level that Austin can get to with his body to become more resilient in these stretches. But the Lakers did eventually settle in.

They managed to hold their ground and kind of linger around the rest of the first half, stayed within that like kind of 10 points range. And then Luke, Luca Donchich, who poured in 21 points in the first half, LeBron James, who just continues to not miss shots, goes five for five in the first half. They just kind of linger. Miami runs a lot of zone in the first half.

They actually had quite a bit of success against it just by setting ball screens against the top man. So like they would just screen the top man and Luca would get down into the lane. He generated a lot of good shots that way. They just stayed close. Then in the second half, the Lakers completely took control of the game. Over 12 minutes span from about five minutes remaining in the second quarter

to about five minutes remaining in the third quarter, the Lakers outscored the heat 48 to 22. It wasn't a pretty defensive night overall for them. They were really bad early in the game and especially over the final few minutes of the game, like we talked about when they were attacking Austin. But they had a stretch. And this is like when you're a good defense, especially an older defense, you can't be expected to go out like the Oklahoma City Thunder every single night,

especially when you're playing 11 games in 19 days and just tighten the screws on everybody for 48 minutes. But the good defenses, and we talk about it. talked about, I've always used Denver as like an example. The good defense is what they can do in that sort of environment. Their offense can kind of keep them close and then they tend to have stretches, a little five minute stretch here, 10 minutes stretch there where they tighten the screws and they get the stops they need to take control of the game. And that was that stretch for the Lakers last night. End of the second quarter, first half of that third quarter, they locked in, they held them to 22 points over 12 minutes and that was when they took control.

control the game. Really impressive help and rotate sequences in that stretch. Like one of the things that the Lakers have gotten really good at is even though they compete really well on the ball, they know they're not going to get a ton of stops on ball because they're going to give up some dribble penetration to speed. They're not the fastest team in the world. But they've become really good at anticipating dribble penetration. You'll see a lot of sequences were like, kind of like last night where you'll see Tyler Harrow drive past Jackson Hayes off the top of the key. And Austin Reeves will help off of Davion Mitchell in the corner. and Tyler will kick it to the corner

and Austin will have to throw a close out, but he's way out of position, and Davy on will rack the clothes out and get middle. And Jackson will just switch and Austin will then just follow Tyler Harrow out to the corner. It's almost like they anticipate dribble penetration. They know it's coming, and they get in front of it with communication,

switching, and quality rotation. So again, they were able to put together one consistent stretch of stops, which ended up being enough for them. And then Luca Donchich just went absolutely, nuclear on offense in the second half. 39 points. Miami ends up going back to mostly man to man in the second half.

They were basically running drop coverage with Killaware and then switching with Bam at a bio. And Luca just fried everyone. The degree to which he was frying Bam at a bio on switches was outrageous. Hit a bunch of step back threes in his face, cleanly beat him off the dribble for a lefty layup at one point. Bam kind of even lost his composure. There was a play in the fourth quarter

where he just ran up and hit Luca in the face, 25 feet from the basket when they were in the penalty because he was losing his composure with how bad Luca was cooking his ass. And then again down the stretch, like Miami made their run because that's what you'd expect, right? Tired Lakers team, take a double-digit lead in the third quarter,

but Miami literally never stops running. They never stop attacking. And they cut the lead to four a few times there in that fourth quarter. But when Luca Donchitz checked back in the game for his last shift, the Lakers scored on 15 of their last 17 possessions. Once again, a variety of moves.

Super deep, catch and shoot three off of the left wing, off of an inbound on a play where Drew Smith fell asleep, more stepback threes, another kind of like and one floater against back pressure along the left lane line, just screaming and fucking one into the stance. I'm loving this like new personality of Luca as he's regained like his trash talking personality

that was kind of missing early in the season. Another like spinning left shoulder hook against the guard. He just had everything going. And again like down the stretch with that exhausted Austin Reeves getting scored on repeatedly, they needed every single one of those 60 points from Luca to win that game. Just an absolutely remarkable nine. from a player that is experiencing a historically great peak. I have five different angles that I want to hit from this Luca Donchage 60 piece. First of all,

Luca dropping 60 points in what should have been a schedule loss, on the road against a top five defense, especially against those coverages, like consistent full court pressure, repeatedly beating one of the best switching bigs in the line, league on an island one-on-one, including 24th quarter points in a close game that could have gone either way, that was unquestionably more impressive than Bam had a bio's 83 points against the Wizards. Bam's 83 was fun. You guys know I had no problem with the heat helping Bam try to pursue that

number, but it was far from the most impressive scoring performance I had ever seen. And I thought it was fitting that Luca went into Miami and put on a demonstration in that building to remind that organization and those fans that there's a difference between a fun gimmick and an all-time great player grabbing you by the fucking throat and strangling you to death the way that Luca did last night. Secondly, what Luca did last night is exactly the kind of thing that sets apart a true superstar in his prime from the guys below that tier. I'm super excited to tell you guys about our partnership with Viori. Those of you guys who are familiar with Viori have noticed,

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We have some big news. What's the news, huge news? We created our own podcast called Hey, Jonas. We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts. We're starting a trend.

but this one's extra special. So how do we actually come up with a name Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember. I think it was on a call about what we should call it. Oh, we were thinking I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band before Jonas Brothers.

This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this. We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, where people could call in and say, hey Jonas. And then I wrote down on my little notepad. Hey Jonas and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys.

Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smigel and Friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an acapella a band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform?

We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind. Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in.

I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise. Breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the story. behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves. Their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down,

give you context, and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports Slice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to Sports Slice. On the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slica Life 12 and the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. The ability to put your team on your back in those circumstances, again, 11th game in 19 days, and simply will them to victory, it's just a reminder that when you have a true superstar at the peak of his powers, especially one in their late 20s, Lucas just turned 27 years old. It can be such a

sheet code because of what they can summon on a night like that. Thirdly, we are witnessing one of the greatest multi-week regular season peaks of basketball in the history of the NBA. There will be conversation about the MVP in the coming days. And I think Luke is at least making it a conversation, which is remarkable considering how good Shay has been this year. I personally think Shay still has a pretty decent sized advantage. But I think Luca has a shot now, especially if you can say,

sustain this through the end of the season. But let's forget about the MVP for a second, because that's very much an 82 game, six-month conversation. And any sort of long-term consistency-based conversation is where things get more complicated for Luca. As we talked about yesterday, consistency is the next step for Luca in his development. But forget about the MVP. Let's just talk about this stretch. This recent stretch from Luca is some of the highest level basketball that has ever been played on this earth. And I would argue it's a higher multi-week peak in the regular season than Shea or Nicola Yolkich has ever reached. In this eight game streak, Luca is averaging 41 points, nine rebounds, seven assists on 66%

true shooting with 3.3 stocks per game. He's averaging two and a half steals. He had five more steals last night. And again, I can't emphasize this enough. He's doing it in an eight-game winning streak, all against great teams, in very important games in the standings every single night. It is very simply one of the highest regular season multi-week peaks in the history of the sport. As I've said, many times.

No one's going to hand out the best player in the world title. in the regular season. Luca's probably going to need to have a run like Yokic did in 2023 to get that credit. And I'm not sure if this Lakers team is up to the challenge. So he may have to wait for another opportunity. But I cannot overstate just how insanely good Luca has been in this stretch. Fourthly, Luca has been so incredibly good in this stretch

that he has lifted his metrics in this season to that of the highest in his career. he's now scoring at a rate of 33.6 points per 36 minutes. That's the highest of his career. He's scored a half point more per game in 2024, but that was in two additional minutes per game. He's up to 61.8% true shooting. That is now the highest true shooting percentage of his entire career.

And in this 12-game stretch where the Lakers are 11 and 1, the Lakers are outscoring teams by 14 points per 100 possessions when he's on the floor. And again, this is literally during the hardest stretch of schedule they've had all season in terms of quality of opponents and density of games. To put it very simply, this is the highest level that Luca has ever reached. Which takes me to my final takeaway. if Luca's going to be this good, and especially if he's going to be this scheme resistant, right, again last night, top five defense, zone looks, drop looks, switching looks against one of the

best switching bigs in the history of the sport, just frying him on an island over and over again, if he's going to be at this level in the postseason, we are all dramatically underrating the chances that the Lakers have to succeed when they get there. Does that mean I think the Lakers are going to go win the title? No. I think there are certainly safer bets out there. In the West, I still view Oklahoma City and San Antonio as on a different tier. But we would all be very foolish to think that the Lakers can't win with that guy in their corner. I don't care who they're playing.

They're going to have a shot if that dude is playing at that level when they get to April and May. last Lakers thing I wanted to hit before we move on to the Spursons game. This has been one of my favorite stretches of LeBron's career to watch. He has basically evolved on the fly into that evolutionary version of Dremont that we all thought he would be at this phase in his career. He just needed to be surrounded by the right amount of ball handling and to have enough belief in the team in order to put in this much work and to devote his resources in that direction.

He was amazing last night. Absolutely dominant on the glass, not only 15 rebounds, but several other kind of contested tapouts that led to Laker rebounds. I thought he was great on defense, competing on the ball, helping and rotating with his teammates.

And he had a triple double because he logged 10 assists almost entirely off the ball. Almost every single one of his assists came driving a closeout, catching on the wing and either making the next pass in the chain to a wide open shooter or ripping a close out,

getting into the lane, drawing help and making amazing kickouts. He had a couple of ridiculous kickouts to Marcus Smart in the corners driving closeouts. He quite literally last night filled all of the gaps for that Laker team

to help them win that game. And again, on the 11th night that they had a game in the last 19 nights on a back-to-back against a brutally tough schedule arriving in Miami at 5 a.m. the day of the game. Since returning from his little brief absence, he's averaging 20 points, 8 rebounds, and 6 assists on 69% true shooting

with 1.5 steals while also being one of the team's best defenders. I've been waiting on him to take a victory lap on the press after that absolutely absurd media cycle from a few weeks ago. Both LeBron and Luca went through some absurd media cycles. And it was crazy because it wasn't born out of nothing. Like there was actually some valid criticism to throw at both guys. But it's just not what I was hearing from a lot of the national media.

Like Luca did deserve some criticism for some of his inefficiencies throughout the year, some of the way that he was interacting with reps and leaning too much on foul grifting, how bad he was on defense at some stretches. He was lagging behind Shea and Yokic for some chunks of the season. But instead of talking about that and those details and putting him at number three instead of number one, we heard about he's 10th in the MVP race or he's not first team all NBA. Or he's hurting the Lakers, just completely absurd stuff. when again there was actually a nuanced conversation to be had

about why Luca was lagging behind Shea and Yokic before this stretch. Same with LeBron. There was a conversation to be had about how the team should lean into Austin as their secondary ball handler once he got healthy and into rhythm. Or how he needed to be much more engaged

possession to possession defensively and as a rebounder. Or how he needed to shoot the ball from three better than he had been. and by the way, he's 40% from three since coming back. But instead, it was like straight up stupid shit. Like the Lakers are better without LeBron, which was absolutely outrageous because anyone who was actually watching the team knew they desperately needed LeBron.

They just needed the ball handling to come around to slot him third. And they needed some more out of him in some key areas. Again, there was a nuanced, valid conversation to have about, LeBron, and that's not what I was hearing. And then LeBron immediately rejoins the team and resoundingly reminded everyone why it was downright insulting. And frankly, an insane thing to say, especially against, like, probably the most consistent proven winner in the history of the NBA, if not Michael Jordan. And last night, he finally took his victory lap in his postgame presser. He said,

they are absolutely wrong. And I'm glad he did. The Lakers are rolling. They get a much needed day off today. Another really tough game tomorrow in Orlando against the magic. I'm excited to see how they show up against a very different type of matchup. Bigger, stronger team, a lot of switching in that matchup. Should be a fun one. Today's show is brought to you by presenting sponsor Hard Rock Bet, Florida's Sportsbook. It's tourney time.

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And guess what? We have some big news. What's the news? Huge news. We created our own podcast called, Hey Jonas. We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it.

We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts. We're starting a trend. But this one's extra special. So how do we actually come up with a name, Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember.

I think it was on a call about what we should call it. And we were thinking I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band before Jonas Brothers. This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this. We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, people could call in and say, hey, Jonas. And then I wrote down on my little notepad, Hey Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys.

Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy. Not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the I-heartedly.

radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind. Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise, breaking down the plays, the controversies,

and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athlete themselves. Their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context, and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports Slice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them. Listen to Sports Slice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

And for more, follow Timbo Slicalife-12 in the TikTok podcast network on TikTok. All right, let's move on to Sun Spurs. This is going to be a potential first round preview if the Suns can get out of that 7-8 game in the play in tournament. And the Suns showed why it's going to be a more challenging first round series than you would think, given the difference

in the team's records. Phoenix is super feisty for a variety of reasons. First of all, they're an elite half-court defense. They're seventh and half-court defensive rating per cleaning the glass. their bigs give them quite a bit of scheme versatility. They have some good rim-protecting drop coverage bigs. Also, a Godaro gives them the ability to run switching looks,

and those switching looks ended up giving the spurs some issues at times last night. And even without Dylan Brooks in the lineup, they've got some guys who can really guard the ball. And Ryan Dunn and Jordan Goodwin. Devin Booker has always been an underrated defender. Gillespie and Grayson Allen both compete and do their jobs. Rishir Fleming has blossomed into one. of the more interesting three and deep prospects in the league in this latter half of the season.

It's just so incredibly useful to have like big, long, like athletes that have the tools that Rishir has, but that also plays super hard all the time and that can hit open catch and shoot threes. He's just brought a whole new dynamic and added to this like culture that they're building there in Phoenix. And they just play super hard. I've talked about this a few times this year, but every season, there are a handful of teams that really stick out to me when I'm watching film as teams that are super sharp in their rotations. And Phoenix has been one of the best that I've watched this year in that particular area. And it shows in the numbers.

They have the second lowest opponent three point percentage in the league this year. They have the third fewest makes that they allow in the NBA this year. Why? Because they fly around and they throw great closeouts. And Jordan Ott deserves a ton of credit for how he's flipped this culture over and how locked in this team is on the margins. they win all the margins now. Not only do they play ridiculously hard on defense,

they relentlessly pursue the offensive glass. You saw that in that fourth quarter. They beat the spurs to a lot of loose balls in that fourth quarter that kept possessions alive. They win the points off of turnover's battle. They win the second chance points battle. They win the fast break points battle. They win on the margins, on average, every night.

It's what makes them so much more endearing to Suns fans than some recent teams that they've had in the last couple years. And it's why Jordanna deserves so much credit for the culture turnaround in Phoenix. It presented the Spurs team with a very interesting challenge. First of all, Steph Castle was out with some tightness in his hip, and he hasn't missed a game in like seven weeks. So that definitely threw a little bit of a wrench in their ball handling.

It just kind of slotted everybody into very different roles offensively. Some of their young players went very cold from three, which is, again, something that Phoenix has done to everybody. And I think file that away because I think that's going to be an interesting kind of thing that we'll see at times in the postseason. and Devin Vassell and Kelden Johnson in particular went cold from three. Victor similarly struggled to find rhythm with his jumper until that final play, which was insane. We'll get to in a minute.

Deer and Fox had a pretty rough first three quarters, although I thought he was amazing in the fourth quarter. I also thought the spurs, again, got a little flummoxed by that mix of switching and drop that Phoenix ran. And again, without Steph Castle, I thought they looked a little bit lost with how to attack at times. And I thought especially in transition, I thought they rushed some transition opportunities that weren't really there. The Spurs log just 0.87 points per transition attack, which is a really low number for this team.

They typically average 1.14 points per transition attack, according to Synergy. And give Phoenix some credit. They generated enough offense throughout the game in various ways to keep the game competitive and to give them leads at various points against a very good San Antonio defense, too. Like Colin Gillespie torched them from three.

He shoots such a soft shot. Like he got multiple, like really soft rolls on the, rim that were pretty crazy last night. Devin Booker was giving Devin Vesel some fits with just like savvy veteran two guard stuff like just really solid footwork on his attacks, drawing fouls, getting open on

back cuts, things along those lines. He's just Devin Booker. You guys know the deal. Igadaro had an insane offensive night. He was hitting a lot of these tough like floaters in Victor's face in the lane. It just presented the spurs with a challenge. They were down 10 points with less than five minutes to go in this

game. And just like the spurs have been able to all season, they summoned their spurs magic and came all the way back to win. They completely locked in on defense and allowed just five points in the final 450 of the game. Wemby got his first block of the game with a couple minutes left. They finally cleaned up some of the stuff on Devin Booker. All of Devin Booker's shot attempts in the final minutes of the game were really, really tough shots, which is a credit to all of the perimeter defenders that ended up on him in that stretch. They cleaned up the defensive glass

after having some issues in the early part of the fourth quarter and then they finally got the offense they needed in the form of Deeran Fox and Victor Wemanniam. I'm bringing this back here because if you remember at various points in the last couple of weeks when I've been talking about San Antonio,

I do think that at times in this post season as it often does, and this happens to everybody, how many times last year on the Thunder did things degrade and it became, can she bring them? home. And that happened yesterday. The shots weren't falling. And it turned into who's going to

create offense first down the stretch. And it was Dearen Fox and Victor Wim and Young. I thought Deer and Fox was fantastic in the fourth quarter. He struggled early in the game, had some turnover issues, was missing his three ball. But in that fourth quarter, he just repeatedly came through. Got a lot of consistent dribble penetration. Man, that like nasty, like, hesitation. dribble with his left hand before he attacks forward. It's disgusting. He can beat people off the dribble with that like crazy. Little spinning turnarounds in the lane finally got a big three point shot to go there off of the left wing. I thought Deeran Fox did exactly what the spurs will need him to do in this postseason. When things degraded into Deer and Fox ball, he was able to get to his spots

and he was able to make shots. Now, is Deer and Fox going to be the best offensive player in a lot of these matchups against teams in the Western Conference? No. But one of the things that did stand out to me in that Warriors series, and it wasn't all perfect. Like you didn't shoot super well from three. His rim finishing went down. He was like around 70% with the Kings in the regular season. And then he was in the mid-50s in that Warriors series. We missed some layups in traffic against a very good Golden State defense. But one of the things that stood out to me in that series against Golden State was Aaron Fox was able to consistently get dribble penetration. And that is one. one of the more valuable things when we look at the spurs as a playoff team. I do think Fox is going

to be able to get to his spots when he gets to the postseason. The big thing is going to be the finishing piece, the rim finishing, which we saw suffer a little bit in that Golden State series, those little turnarounds, those threes, those are going to be the big swing factors for the spurs in this playoff run. And then Victor just kind of manufactured points all night. Once again, like when the jumper was off, he just found ways to get to the foul line with physical drives, the vertical spacing element. He had every night, Victor has like two or three of these just like completely outrageous plays that don't even make sense.

He had one off of a, I can't remember who it was that drove baseline. I think it might have been Devin Vassell, but he like flipped up a lob to Wembe in front of the rim. And he like caught it with his left hand and fluidly like softly caught it and fluidly like fed it into the basket while fighting somebody off with his right hand. There's just a ridiculous finish. traffic. And then on the final play, they get a stop. They go down and they score, Darren Fox, I think it's that driving left-handed layup. They go down, they get another stop.

10 seconds left. Oswe Godaro fights through, doesn't give up the switch. Victor Wemnon Yamas got him on the right elbow. And he just goes to that rip-through move to the right, just a solid rip-through, left-right footwork, rises up, fades a little bit, and knocks down the game winner. The thing that I kept thinking about when I watched that show, shot was literally no one will ever be able to stop that shot. As long as he can protect the basketball down low, which again, guys will try to attack him down low. So he's going to have to really rip through arms and add like a little bit of a physicality to that move. But no one will ever be able to stop Victor Weminyama

from ripping right and going to a one dribble pull-up. And especially when he gets it closer to the rim like that, I've talked about this a lot. One of the big reasons why I like mid-range shooting in the clutch is it just becomes a higher percentage shot. The best guys on stepback threes might shoot 40%. You can get to a point as a shooter where you're hitting 55, 58% on those pull-up twos, just like Shagos as Alexander has for the most part this year. And if he gets to the point where he's hitting 55, 58% on those pull-up twos off the dribble, that is going to be something that carries the spurs home on a lot of given nights.

I was talking yesterday, and this was just a misspeaking on my part, about how the best player in the world title kind of feels up in the air to me. Niccoli Okic, obviously, has had a really rough time since he came back from his knee injury. He hasn't been very good on defense. He's had massive turnover issues. His efficiency is cratered on a lot of key shots, particularly his three-point shot, some of his short-range shot-making. It feels up in the air, and it's a four-man race.

Shea, I think, kind of has the inside track right now, but we've all seen Luca. Luca's very short sample, but this two, three weeks stretch from Luca is some of the best basketball that's ever been played on Earth. Victor Wenamah, we know because of what he does defensively, he's in that conversation. He's got to add a playoff resume to it, but he's in that conversation. And then don't, we'd all be stupid to just write off Nicola Yokic. But Victor Women Yamah's in that group. Victor Women Yamah has the potential this year to make. that statement. I thought last night was a really interesting example of just how resilient

he is in the sense that it's an ugly offensive game. Teams really struggling to score. He's having a hard time with this three-point shot, but just a dominant defensive run in the fourth quarter, able to manufacture points at the foul line and as a vertical spacer. And then it doesn't matter how poorly you shoot the ball if you make the big one. And he made the big one late in the game. I cannot wait for this playoff run because it very much feels like this is up in the air between those four guys. And I think all four of them are going to have something to say. Yeah, a couple of them have better teams than others, but like I cannot wait to see these dudes have this showdown in this Western Conference playoff run. Lastly, before we get out of here today,

looking forward to a potential son's spurs matchup in the postseason. I think it's going to be a very good first taste of playoff action for the Spurs. I think it would be problematic for them to just beat the crap out of some bad team and then walk into a super tough second round series. I mean, Oklahoma City had that problem last year. Super easy first round series against Memphis. Denver catches them off guard and damn near goes up 3-1, right? I think Phoenix is going to, if they can win that 7-8 playing game, I think Phoenix is going to bring

the fight right to the spurs. They're going to be physical on the perimeter. They're going to play some of their guards into poor shooting performances. It's going to be a series that they're going to have to win like you saw last night, winning with defense, winning with clutch, like late game sequences where they just completely strangle the team on one end and they have to grind out points. Deere and Fox getting to his spots. Victor Wembenyama manufacturing points at the foul line and as a vertical spacer,

big buckets and big spots late in games. I think San Antonio is going to struggle a little bit with Phoenix. I'm going to pick San Antonio, but I actually think it'll be really beneficial because they're going to probably end up in a pretty tough second round series against someone like a Minnesota or against the Lakers or against a Denver.

And I think it would be really good for them to have a very good battle against a very good team in that first round series against Phoenix. And I think there are some things from last night that will translate to that series and turn it into a tougher one for them. It'll be a perfect, like, baptism by fire for a young group with some high expectations this year. All right, guys, that's all I have for today. As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting us and supporting the show.

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. Hey, guys, it's us and the Jonas Brothers. I'm Joe. I'm Kevin. And I'm Nick. And guess what? We created our own podcast called, Hey, Jonas. We invented a podcast?

Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. We get to ask other people questions because we're sick and tired of being asked questions. Well, sick and tired is a strong way to put it, but, you know, tired and sick. Tired and sick. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen.

We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes.

Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, fam, it's Isaiah Thomas. And I'm CJ Toledano. It's our favorite time of the year on our podcast, Point Game. the playoffs. We're digging into the biggest surprises of the season, and I'm looking back on some of my greatest playoff moments. If we didn't talk ever again, I was crying. You just understood.

That's how personal it got. Wow. Then after that game seven, Mark keep coming to, he's like, you know I love you, dog. You know, it's all love. This was just playoffs. This was just basketball. So listen to Point Game on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life. That is not the look of an innocent man. Is everyone lying to me about who they are? I felt such desperation.

I felt it was what I had to do. Listen to Deep Cover the Family Man on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.