The Zach Lowe Show - Knicks Comeback, Towns Comes Up Huge, and Both Conference Finals Inch Closer With Rob Mahoney

Episode Date: May 26, 2025

Zach is joined by Rob Mahoney to cover a pair of 2-1 conference finals, starting in the East (1:12), where it was the Knicks' turn for a comeback in the series. What did they change, and how will Indiana react moving forward? Before heading west, Zach details his journey with Mets fandom in a special MLB Interlude (49:11). Then, Rob rejoins as they discuss the Western Conference finals, and whether Minnesota’s huge Game 3 is a sign of things to come (57:40). Host: Zach Lowe Guest: Rob Mahoney Producers: Jesse Aron, Jonathan Frias, Mike Wargon The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Get started today at HubSpot.com/AI Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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All right, coming up on a Memorial Day, Zach Lowe show, we got Rob Mahoney. It's a Mahoney Monday. talking about, yeah, another wild Nick Pacers game and we got a series. Maybe we got a series in the east. We got a series in the West. We're going to dive deep into both series. What comes next,

especially in Game 4, Indiana, New York. Might have a little nostalgic, heartfelt baseball interlude. I'm not sure. That's all coming up on the Zach Lowe show. The Zach Lowe show. Happy Memorial Day and happy we got some series day because it didn't

look like we were going to get any series. And instead we got two series. Minnesota blows the doors off to Oklahoma City Thunder in game three. I don't know what the hell happened in that game. Suddenly they were up by 40 points and I was like, okay, I guess we're going to get some garbage time. Let's go, baby. And then

last night, Rob Mahoney, it's all going bad for the Knicks. Starting lineup change reeks of a little panic, reeks of a little searching. Josh Hart, maybe it was his idea. Maybe it was his idea. In retrospect, maybe it really was his idea. I don't know. It's not working

down 20. Throwing the ball all over the gym. Crowds going crazy. Tyrese Halliburton is strutting. Jalen Brunson's in foul trouble. Cats in foul trouble. Permanent State of Affairs for Cat, although less so than usual. Jalen Brunson, new addition to foul trouble. Cats in foul trouble in part because of one of the all-time great challenge outcomes for a coach, Rick Carlyle in the second quarter. It's all coming apart. It's still a 15-point game late in the third quarter. It's still 15. It feels like it got closer, faster than it was. And then Indiana kind of lost the plot.

A deuce McBride. Mini explosion happened. And then Carl Anthony Towns. Maybe, honestly, Rob, I'd have to go back into the archives of Carl Anthony Towns games. It's certainly not the most explosive game

he's ever played. It's certainly never artistic when that big body starts moving from the arc to the rim. Limbs are flailing. Mouths are a gap, screams are happening at different tones of voices. Sometimes it's low. Sometimes it's how you never know how Kat's voice is going to sound in an interviewer

during a game. And yet, it might be my favorite Carl Anthony Towns game of all time. It certainly is the grittiest and the toughest circumstances, considering the circumstances. I mean, the fourth quarter, 20 points, and it had everything. It had a kickout three off a yet another Josh Hart rebound. Josh Hart, the unsung hero of the. the game. We'll get to that. It had

multiple drives against Miles Turner and Tony Bradley. Tony Bradley, hello. Kind of forgot he was on the Pacers. I'm being completely honest until game two. And one of the drives, just the most classic cat drive where he's got the ball

up top, some fluff is happening on the right side, like a pin down, a flare screen. And cat stares over there in the most over theatrical exaggerated way. Like, yes, I am going to pass the ball over. there. Tony Bradley, we look over there. Tony Bradley's like, no, you're not. And then he drives by him anyway, draws a foul. He had a back cut for a dunk. He had the dunk all over Andrew Nemhard's face. Just like the full variety. And he had one post up where he drew a foul on Pascal Seacum. And that was notable to me, Rob Mahoney, because it was the only possession of the game and maybe of the series in which Indiana intentionally cross-matched and put Miles Turner, on Josh Hart and somebody else on Kat.

It's clear they don't want to do that. I'm not sure it's clear that not wanting to do that is the correct decision by Rick Carlisle, who makes almost only correct decisions. And the Knicks take the lead. Jalen Brunson picks up a fifth foul yet another moment where you're like, oh my God, it's over, it's going to spiral out of control. And the Knicks hold steady and hold steady. And then Miles Turner misses a three, which we'll talk about with like 23 seconds left

in the game, the Knicks make their goddamn free throws. I know. They made their goddamn free throws. And it's 2-1. And we got a series of Rob Mahoney, all my Knicks fans' friends in Connecticut, you got to back me up on this. They're all asking me in the last two days. Is it over? Is it just done?

We're going to trade cat? Is Tib's awake? Like, what's happening? And I said, look, game one, they should have won, obviously. Home court, like, I guess doesn't exist anymore. This team is completely capable of winning two games on the road in Indiana. It's like, unless they're mentally, broken. It looked like they might have been mentally broken and then they weren't.

Rob Mahoney, what a fun weekend of hoops. Where do you want to start on this Eastern Conference semi-final 90s throwback series? What is the most important place to start as we head into the proverbial game, the proverbial pivotal game four? I think the reason we have a series at all, the reason any of that stuff happened that you described to me is because in the second quarter, in the midst of that enormous pacer's run. I want to give the Knicks credit for not folding there, for coming back and playing with incredible resilience, in part because, you know, we give Tibbs a lot of grief

about the ways in which he is inflexible, about the ways in which he is stuck in his own ways as far as who he wants to be as a coach and how he wants his teams to play. If we're going to do that, we have to also give the Knicks credit when they are stubborn motherfuckers and they are resilient and they just run straight through the wall in the second half.

As far as, yeah, there's some tactical changes, there's some lineup changes. There's stuff happening. But the Knicks staying in this game after that downpour, I find to be incredibly impressive. For a team that, as we talked about all throughout the regular season, had been a little rocky, had been a little uneven, didn't always seem like they were on the same page.

Josh Hart was calling people out in the media. Mikhail Bridges calling people out in public about the varying agendas within this team during the regular season. You didn't see any of that in the second half. You didn't see any of that when all of a sudden the defensive miscues, the defensive miscommunications that were there in game two, there were such a glaring problem. All of a sudden, a lot of that stuff got cleaned up.

A lot of that stuff got really ironed out in just the most impressive fashion possible to basically save New York season at this stage. And save the East playoffs and save, you know, the next 48 hours of fun talking about the series. You mentioned the defense. My God, that they ratcheted up in the second half. just simple things like Stan Van Gundy on the broadcast mentioned a couple of times great transition

defense by the Knicks and it was obvious when there were circumstances when it looked like a jailbreak and then it wasn't. But as he was saying that, I flashed back to the first half, I think it was the second quarter. Cat missed a three and there was a long rebound but it was clear it was going to go to the

Pacers. But Kat kind of like lurched for it and then when he didn't get it, he did the thing where it's like, can I just keep lurching and maybe get in somebody's or deflect the ball. And Siakum just outran everybody and got a layup. And it's like, that's the stuff you just can't give Indiana. And the Knicks didn't do any of that.

There was no lurching. There was no wrong step forward. There was nothing. And, you know, we can talk about like what, if anything, happened to the Pacer's offense for it to get bogged down a little bit. I give a lot of credit to the Knicks defense here. We're just flying around, flying around. But I think a key stat that I haven't read all the postgame coverage.

I don't know if it's gotten enough play. Um, first half, um, uh, New York commits six turnovers. Three of them are Indiana steals. Third quarter, New York commits six more turnovers. All six are Indiana steals. And Indiana forced those plays, forced those steals. Josh Hart's bringing the ball up because Brunson does want to do it. That's kind of a disaster.

There's pressure. There's balden out. Credit to Indiana. Fourth quarter, New York, two turnovers. None of them are steals. And I think that as much as anything, as much as cash, as much as the Deuce McBride run, as much as Jalen Brunson coming back

and making a clutch bucket, whatever, that to me was maybe the defining stat of the comeback. They just took away all the easy points. They took care of the ball. They made sure to get a shot up. And by the way, Indiana's superpower and Tyrese Halliburton's superpower is they don't turn the ball over.

They are able to play fast and loose and unpredictable and random without the usual consequence of high turnovers. they get a shot almost every time. It's so stupid. It's so fundamental. And yet it's such a powerful thing. And the Knicks were not doing that.

And then they were doing that. And in the process, taking away, let's say, eight to 10 easy points in transition. And that was, if you want to talk about why the Pacers got bogged down, some of that is on the Pacers. A lot of that is like those easy points got vaporized. For sure. And we talk about both sides of the ball often as if they're discrete things. I thought this game was a great reminder of the way. that offense influence defense and vice versa.

The only reason those Knicks lineup survived that had Landry Shamit and Dillon Wright and Mitchell Robinson on the floor together is because those lineups are forcing turnovers. They were creating offense for groups that would not be able to score otherwise or would be incredibly reliant on like cat bailouts in some of those situations.

I think the Indiana part of that is huge in terms of their turnovers. Like you mentioned it, they are not a team that turns the ball over. Basically no defense throughout these playoffs has been able to turn them over to this point, including the Knicks until the second half of this game. Indiana turning the ball over on 19% of its possessions in the second half.

That is higher than any of their games, any other playoff games this year, higher than any of their games this year other than two. This is just not something that happens to the Pacers. I think, again, we can get into the minutious, like why New York's defense was successful in doing that. Ultimately, I think they were able to just jam them so much in terms of their normal routine ball movement. they were navigating screens so much more effectively.

They were doing so many of the basic things at such a high level, at a real genuine championship level, which has not been the case for the Knicks often enough, which certainly had not been the case for them in the series. And the Pacers are hard to play against. And maybe the reality is it just takes you a little bit of time at minimum to the extent that that is repeatable to even figure out how to do it in the first place. I did enjoy Rick Carlyle's post-game answer about why it was harder to score

in the second, in the fourth quarter. He's like, well, you know, they had more of their good defensive players. We're there. I think you said their best defensive players on the floor. The flip side of that is the unsaid flip side of that is obviously like they didn't have some of their bad defensive players on the floor. Then you look back and like, who wasn't on the floor? Well, Kat was on the floor the entire fourth quarter.

Brunson was not on the floor for most of the fourth quarter. And you just know that there's part of it, Carla, and say, I just wasn't just plant a little seed. Oh, yeah. I know Brunson's playing 45 minutes if he's not in foul trouble regardless, but just plant a little seed. Like, were they harder to play against without that sort of thing to pick at

with Deuce McBride and three good wing defenders and cat? Were they a little harder? Just plant that little seed. It's both ways too. It's like Tom Tibido, are you sure you don't want to play Landry's Shamit at 42 minutes? You know, like this was a really tough defensive front with all due credit to him.

But genuine question, Zach, do the Knicks win this game if Jalen Brunson is not in foul trouble? Because finding those minutes for those random as defensive oriented lineups, it swung the game. Like it changed the energy of the entire thing. And if Jalen Brunson is out there for his normal allotment playing his normal way, which is very effective on balance, but not defense first, as Rick Carlisle alluded to,

do the Knicks win this? Well, let's even broaden it out and say, did the lineup change make a difference? Did starting Mitchell Robinson make any difference to you? I honestly don't know that it did. I think it may be a subtle one and repositioning, you know, the previous starters have been bleeding points all throughout the postseason. Everyone's been talking about it.

Repositioning their minutes to a different portion of the game, I thought served that lineup pretty well. Were the new starters with Mitchell Robinson, like world beaters? I thought they were good. They were better, you know, better on balance, ultimately more effective defensively.

In the end, I thought it kind of came out in the wash, and I'm not sure it changes a huge amount about this series. And if, you know, I'm sure once the page, Easter's get used to that look too with even greater frequency. They're going to find new things to attack within it. But ultimately, I thought this game changed with the foul trouble for Kat and for Brunson. And as you said, Kat rebounded in such a huge way in the fourth quarter.

A monster, monster performance, it's not as most explosive game as you alluded to, but just in terms of holy shit plays that Kat has made throughout his career, I thought this was just an astronomical high concentration of those plays within that stretch of time at a point when the Knicks absolutely needed it. And he held up defensively, minus one or two hiccups where they got lucky. And I'm thinking of Miles Turner

pick and pop three that was wide open. The Knicks are not going to send an extra defender flying at him. And Kat kind of, he dropped on the pick and roll, kind of took a false step backwards, lost his balance a little bit, and was super late recovering.

But other than that, and I'm thinking of the possession, I think it's all the same possession, when Annobe Swats, I think is it Niece Smith where he just like the ball barely gets out of Neesmith's hands and he swats it into the floor. Not a good sign for the health of your offense at that moment in time that Aaron Neismiss, like I got to go one on one against O.G. Nidobie on the block because there's six seconds left on the clock and we got nothing going on. Well, look, I mean, I think part of what happened to the Pacer's offense and this is what happens to offenses when they are faced with suddenly more intense and dialed in defenses.

is they lost a little bit of their zip for parts of this game. They lost a little bit of the random. It's like a focused randomness. It's random like guys are just going to start setting crazy screens. And like when you think the possession has reached its end point, like cat on Halliburton on a switch. No, here comes Siakum screen slips out of it. And you're like, what are we doing? What's happening?

They lost a little bit of that. And you mentioned Neesmith, you know, down two points. People are going to forget about this possession. Down two points. Brunson comes right back in the eight. scores to put the Knicks up 100 to 98. I'm looking at the play by play now. Next possession, a minute to go. Tyrese Halliburton runs a staggered pick and roll, I think, gets cat on him. Okay, that's good. Seems like a good place to start. There's like 13 on the

shot clock. Kicks it out. Doesn't get it back. And the play ends with Neesmith, taking a runner against Jalen Brunson from the corner. And you're like, there were a few possessions like that. And in particular late in the third quarter when the Knicks scratched back into the game, where it was like, Pacers kind of lost the plot a little bit on offense. And in that late third quarter, now I'm getting scattered, but in that late third quarter, there's about a minute where Halliburton and Siakum sit at the same time. And I'm watching the game.

I'm like, that's just a red alert, no. It's just a no, you can't do it. And immediately the offense stalls out. There's like an illegal screen. There's a top in back down against Shamit that goes, it's an offensive foul. And then they bring Seacom back into the game, like a minute later. like, okay, we obviously need one of these guys in the game.

And T.J. McConnell, who admitted kind of in that between quarters interview, like, I kind of rushed it a little bit, just kind of played as if Siakum was still not on the floor and was just running around, taking crazy shots. Mitchell Robinson blocked him at the rim. It's like, settle, settle it down. But you mentioned the Neesmith floor. But anyway, on that, on that same play where Ananoi stuffs, Neesmith, it starts with back to back Halliburton Turner pick and rolls. And Kat, navigates both of them okay. And the second one in particular, he drops back. Miles Turner short rolls. And Kat, this is all you got to do. Don't get out of position and get big with your arms. And the pocket pass isn't there.

And they have to reset and it ends in that. And that's all I'm asking out of Kat. Just like you're not a great defensive player. You're never going to be. But get big and don't lurch. And he did enough of that in the fourth quarter. Obviously, it's a great fourth quarter for Kat. Phenomenal.

And to your point, to the point about the Robinson adjustment, he plays no minutes in the fourth quarter. No. None. And that's sort of the push and pull of Kat in one game. Like, we start Mitchell Robinson over Josh Hart, and Kat now shifts to the four.

And he's kind of a spacer in a lot of possessions. We're going to screen and roll with Robinson. That's where Kat's a little bit marginalized on offense, but you take the tradeoff for what it does to your defense. And you take the, a lot of it is also just about separating heart and Robinson for spacing purposes. But a lot of it, some of it is, Cat shifts to the fore and that's better for your defense.

It's also worse for his offense. In the long run, probably worse for your offense. Season on the line, we go back to Cat at the Five, and it works. And maybe one of the reasons it survives defensively is that Brunson, to your point, is also not on the far. But that's like, that's the push and pull of Kat that we've been dealing with his entire career.

It's why the wolves traded for Rudy Gobert. He's just such a fascinating player. And credit to him, they put him back at the five. He figured it out. He usually figures out how to score at the four. He didn't really in this game. But it's,

I don't really know what the, who would you start? Like who, I guess they're going to start. Usually you win and you just say, we're going to start the lineup that we won with. I guess they'll start with that again. I think I would start it again.

I think one change I would make was, I don't understand why Tibbs is stretching Mitchell Robinson's stints to the degree that they are. Like, Kat went out first in the first quarter. Mitchell Robinson stays in the game. This is a player who's in, entire value is based on balls to the wall energy high, like high energy rebounding style.

If you give Mitchell Robinson shorter bursts, I think he's all the more effective. And this is one of the ways in which this game, while undeniably impressive, there's some factors that have some diminishing returns I'm a little concerned about from New York's perspective. Like this is just a little too much Mitchell Robinson, I think overall. Like you're really stretching him to his limit. I think you saw in the second half like some of the diminishing returns with his defense specifically, I was blown away by the Landry Shamit Dilan Wright minutes. How reliable is that going to be going forward?

Is that the kind of thing that wins you the one crucial playoff game and swings it in a way you need to? Or is one of those actual rotation ballast in a way that New York needs? And overall, like with that starting five, like, are you repositioning their minutes within the game? Are they still going to play minutes? Like, I would say they played with some of their best concentrated minutes in this game, probably throughout the playoffs.

It was about four minutes, right? like, are those guys going to play together or continue to in any meaningful capacity? Those are some things for New York I'm kind of like, have my eye on. But there's so much to work with defensively in terms of the energy and communication they played with. That's kind of what you have to hang your hat on for them.

So the right shamit minutes are super interesting to me because I know there was like a subset of New York fans that were clambering for this. And it felt to me like sometimes it sounds smart when you just say like play the guy who's not playing. Sure. It's a very obvious adjustment to suggest. I'm not really sure either.

I mean, Shamet made one big three, and that's what he's on the floor to do. I don't think the Pacers were really focused enough on targeting him on defense, and that would change if he plays again. Well, he did. He's a decent lock and trail type defender. And so I think one of the crucial parts of the Knicks staying so connected defensively and being so disruptive to the Pacer's offense was they didn't give up easy switches.

They made the Pacers earn those switches. and they did it by strategically going under against guys like McConnell, for example. Oh, finally. I mean, like, it's been right there right in front of you the whole time. I want to say this now before I forget. Please. They lost game two in the McConnell minutes. I mean, you can figure out whether you can criticize the Brunson three at the end of the game.

I'm going to talk about that shot later. If you want to boil down to me, where did that game get away from the Knicks? It's not knowing how to guard McConnell. And it's like, you should go under screens against McConnell. to his credit, he makes that more difficult than it should be. And he makes a little short jumpers and he beat you to the spot last night. He played well again when they were going under. But there is no need to blitz T.J. McConnell, which is what they did over and over again,

I think late in the third, early in the fourth game two. Maybe it's late in the second early. I think it's late in the third early in the fourth. And their whole defense, and they had Mitchell Robinson and Kat on the floor at the same time for a lot of this. When you do that, you're asking big guys to rotate around the first. floor and the Pacers are like, you can't keep up. Ben Shepard, random cut, Seacom-Cut, Seacom-Card-3. Seaccombe random cut, Ben Shepard 3.

And I'm sitting there watching, it's like, why are you treating him T.J. McConnell like Steph Curry, just play a softer, calmer defense. And honestly, look, the Knicks fans will sit here and say, we should be up 3-0. You could do the should be, would be any direction you want. They absolutely should have won game one. Like, that's just a, literally, it was a one-hundred-it-broad-it-probability skills. It was a 100-percent win-probability game they lost. they kind of, you know, they got back into it at the end, but the Pacer's built to 9, 10, point.

To me, they lost that game in those minutes. And that's why the playoffs are so interesting because every rotation decision is important and every rotation decision is magnified. Every three-minute stretch, even the ones you don't remember, like that to me is where they lost that game. Sorry, TJ, you were talking about T.J. McConnor,

and I got mad because I couldn't believe how they were guarding that stuff. No, rightly so. And they almost lost it again. Like McConnell had a really productive first stint. And then by the end of it and into the second, you're not quite getting the same results from T.J. McConnell because the Knicks have changed the way they're guarding it.

They've changed the way they're guarding, period. I think going under selectively. I mean, they even got away with it on guys like Halliburton or Nemhart here and there, just like very selective. We don't think you're taking the pull-up in this exact moment. We're going to shoot the under and try to get on the other side and they got away with it. But also kind of with those switches, trying to get through it and switching if they have to. And that's a really high-wire act in terms of the execution of that.

We saw in game two the ways it doesn't work. I thought the switching in game two was almost like conflict avoidant. They were just like, I'm going to pass this off because this is what we've agreed we're going to do, but we don't switch enough to actually communicate this effectively. Oh, wait, Miles Turner's open for a dunk, disaster. In this game, there was a lot more trying to fight through it, stall it out, string out the possession. At least it's kind of forcing the Knicks to stay connected on the perimeter.

Like they're having to step up into the switch rather than step back into the switch. And that kind of thing, I think honestly helps a lot, helps stall the possessions out for the pacer's a little bit, helps keep them engaged defensively on the perimeter. It also, if you can fight through that stuff and avoid all of the random switches that Indiana's movement will put you through, it keeps your defense intact. It keeps it in the shape it's supposed to be in. And so then when you look at, oh, why are the Knicks rotating so effectively? Why are they closing out so effectively?

It's because everyone's where they're supposed to be. And Mitchell Robinson isn't out 25 feet from the basket all of a sudden. Like, those layering changes, I think, have a real impact on, like, overall the NIC's ability to execute the defensive game plan that they wanted to. And even when they weren't where they were supposed to be, their effort was just outrageous. And I'm thinking particularly of, I think it was like 220 left in the game, a possession that ends with Miles Turner missing like a 30 foot three. It's a Halliburton Turner pick and roll, and Turner pops open. And both Bridges, who is guarding Halliburton, and I think Cat, who is on Turner,

sprint to Miles Turner. That's a bridge. breakdown. That's a mistake. That's two guys rotating in one place. And you're like, well, that's death. I mean, that's what Indiana does. They break you down. They make you panic. They make, they make, with their speed, they make you uncertain, and they make you second guess what you think you should do. And two guys go to Turner. Well, that's bad. And they rotated out of it

with such precision and urgency. Like, Kat went all the way back and found Siakum. Seacom's guy went one up one spot and found Nemhart. Nembart's guy went up one spot and found Hallibbara. and the possession died. And it's like even when they weren't where they were supposed to be, they ended up in good enough position to get stops.

You mentioned Robinson diminishing returns. What did you mean by that? I think the longer you play him, the harder it is for him to be at his utmost effectiveness, like any player, but especially with him. Like he's, for one, I think getting into better condition as the playoffs go on clearly,

but this isn't a guy who had a full regular season of conditioning. This is somebody who's been thrown into the mix late in the game. and you can see the longer he plays individual stints, I think his effectiveness tapers off a little bit. And overall, the deeper you get into some of these games, his effectiveness tapers off a little bit. And so I just, I worry a little bit about 28, 29 minute Mitchell Robinson versus 18 to 22 minute Mitchell Robinson.

And a lot of that depends on how good cat is. A lot of that depends on, as we said, the push and pull of his foul trouble, his defense, his shot making, whether he's driving as effectively as he did in this game against Turner specifically. And that honestly might have been the big lever for Rick Carlyle as far as finally getting that cross match you were talking about up top as like, Cat driving against Miles Turner

was so effective and finishing through contact. That's such a huge thing. If Kat's doing all that stuff, I don't know that you need as much Mitchell Robinson, but clearly they need to fill out the rotation in some way. He's going to have to play big minutes in this series. I'm not saying he shouldn't. I'm just wary of pushing those minutes a little bit too far.

Well, there was one, I mean, I'd have to go rewatch the whole game, but there was one late in his stint in the first quarter. I think he plays like the first 11 minutes of the first quarter or so like that. There was one possession getting back on defense where you could see huffin and puffin. It's hard. He could not get back. And the pacer, someone got dunk out of it. And it's like he's gassed.

He's gased. And he's going from zero to like a thousand in this series. Josh Hart, you mentioned, you know, who's going to play when how much of this, how much rearranging are you really doing? He comes off the bench and ends up playing 34 minutes and all the most. important minutes of the game. Everyone has focused on the rebound he got at the end of the game on the Miles Turner potential go-ahead three, where he's sourging and snags a contested rebound. And that's just like what in real time, I was like, that's a good rebound.

It's just like a Josh Hart play. And I mentioned the off of it. Anytime what Josh Hart has to do in this series and he did it to a T in this game is when they help off of him and they're going to, he has to get offensive rebounds. and they got two major kickout threes on Josh Hart being ignored. One was Ananobe who quietly four of six from three, and every single one of them felt like a life refth when they went in. And then Towns got one late in the game.

And I just like, and he had another play. He just puts out these little fires. Like the Pacers ran this floppy action on the baseline where like shooters were intersecting. It was Mathurin. Oh, my God, Matherin. Oh, he's minus 30, I think, in 41 minutes in the series. Yeah, minus 31 and 40 minutes, I transpose it. And getting played off the floor.

Yeah. He's playing January basketball right now, like just completely out of his mind. And they went super big for a couple of stretches in the last two games. I'm wonderful C. Jarris Walker. But anyway, so they're dancing around the baseline. And the Knicks screw up. And someone's, I think Matherin's coming open. Josh Hart's on Siakum.

Josh Hart darts off Seacom to, like, put out the Matherin fire for just a second. Ben Shepard has the ball. And he's like, oh, Seacom's open underneath. I'm going to enter the ball to him. Josh Hart flies back, deflex the entry pass in the air, steel, and I think Cat gets a trail dunk out of it. Did you make a noise when Cat hit the inverted pick and roll three where he kicked his leg out?

And it was like, that went in? What happened? Like that was, that was, I mean, it's Cat. That's all cat, the whole full cat experience. That one rolled in, too. It was like the ball wasn't even sure and wanted to exactly corkscrew down on that. but the audacity of cat shots, and I think his assertiveness inside and out,

again, is really one of these central reasons why the Knicks won this game. His ability to carry some of those lineups with Brunson out. Even when Brunson was in, to act as like a really effective counterpoint, you mentioned those two Josh Hart kickouts. The one for me was the cat kickout specifically. That was the first possession of the fourth quarter.

Josh Hart pulled down that board among like three different pacer. And rather than go straight up, as many players would do, he finds cat for that three, cuts the game to single digits. I don't think it's ever quite the same after that. You saw the slow deterioration in the fourth quarter of kind of the Pacer's offense and their flow and their rhythm. But a lot of that transition play is undercut

by guys like Josh Hart crashing the offensive glass. Obviously, it's one of the best deterrence to getting teams out and running. I think to look at Josh Hart's box score contributions, eight points, 10 to rebounds, four assists, does not tell the half of what he did. And, I mean, for one, four of those eight points were game-sealing free throws,

as you mentioned up top, the kind that the Knicks have not been. Which all of Nick's nation must have been, not just for just any Nick. It wouldn't have mattered who is at the line except maybe Brunson who also makes two. I don't know how you even watch the screen if you're a Knicks fan after what happened in game one. A lot of activated trauma, but you know, he's helping people to heal. And so to have those points be as crucial as they were and all 10 of those rebounds, not just that one spectacular grab are high leverage crucial rebounds. What Josh Hart does.

It's absolutely what he does. It's the reason why you, you, you, You deal with the fact that he's not being guarded, while you deal with some of the quirks of his game, while you try to make time and make a place for a player like that. Because when it comes down to it, you want him on the floor. This episode is brought to you by HubSpot. Growing a business can feel impossible, but HubSpot's customer platform can help. It's powered by a suite of AI tools called Breeze. So you can generate more leads, close more deals, and scale your service fast.

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And Hart is on the floor. If you're the Pacer's coaching staff, do you make an adjustment and put Turner on Hart and someone else on Kat, see Akam, probably on Kat, to try to take away the drives, the pick and pop threes, which is not really getting a lot of those, but that's been the smart team counter to Kat all season

and the Pacers have been resistant to doing it. I think because of what, in part, the first time they did it, Kat bowled over Seacom and drew a foul. I think Seacom can hang in that matchup. I think I would dabble in it a little bit more, would you? I would too. I think for as plausible as it is that Seaccom might foul cat on one of those drives,

what you're trying to not give up is what Turner gave up, which is the first step, turn the corner momentum. And I thought Miles is a really good defender. He's done well in this series overall. I said an amazing playoff run. I think there's a lot to commend about the way he's been playing. Guarding up to the three-point line in the face of a guy like Kat is not as

as strong as suit. And you can see him be out of his depth a little bit on that first step. And Kat is then getting the momentum that's allowing him to make these other plays. Seacom is going to give up some strength. He's going to give up some size. There's going to be plays where Towns makes it look really easy. there's also going to be the other town's plays where he makes everything look very, very hard

and elbows Pascal Seacum in the face and it's a turnover going the other way. Jalen Brunson is the best player on this team, but Towns is such a great avatar for the chaos incarnate New York Knicks. Everything is a double-edged sword. Everything is dramatic. It's always going to be riding on the edge of something.

And I think you want to lean into that by putting Pascal on him more. It's amazing that within games, my brain my irrational like emotionally into the game brain is swinging from like well they got to look at trading cat

this off season two cat's the most important player on the team and they're dead in the water without him just for the record I don't care about the officiating stuff generally

I do want to say I thought I mentioned the challenge that Carlisle took in the second quarter that turned a cat and won over Halliburton where he drove him

from the corner and this is what I mentioned the grittiness of cat twice in this game you could see him tempted to do the jab step three-pointer from the corner once with Halliburton, once with Turner. And both times he was like, you know what?

It's the freaking playoffs, man. We just need some buckets. We need some points. I'm going to power through these guys. And he powers through Halliburton, dunks, and one. They take forever to shoot a free throw and give the Pacers enough time to challenge the play. And it turns into a nullified and one and Katz's third foul for hooking Halliburton.

I thought that should have been, should have stood. I thought Halliburton fouled him first. I just want to say for the record. I thought Halliburton fouled them first. Kat's arm might be coming up. It also might be coming up in response to the fact that Halliburton's already grabbing it. I thought that was a bad overturn and screwed the Knicks. I thought Brunson's fifth foul should have been a charge on Nemhart.

Agree on that one for sure. And I couldn't believe they lost that challenge. So I do think the Knicks, a little bit of a tough whistle from the replay perspective last night. That fifth foul in Brunson, obviously a huge swing play. It takes him out of the game. I also want to say as far as like the rebounding and rebounding within this game goes. Kat obviously had the early foul trouble

bounced back in such a huge way in the fourth quarter. Deuce McBride came in this game in the first half and committed three fouls in like 90 seconds. It's like, okay, you're done. You're out of here. Get out of Deuce McBride. Him coming back and having such a huge impact on this game, just a phenomenal story within the larger story.

Like the reason that Jalen Brunson played two minutes and 45 seconds of the fourth quarter and the Knicks fucking won. Like, that just does not happen. Obviously, it just has not happened very often because why would you ever take Jalen Brunson off the floor? But part of the reason why he didn't come back until I think it was 137 left

is because the Deuce lineups were working. Like, you're trying to protect Jailen Brunson's foul trouble, but also there's the Tom Tibadoian urge to just like, let's just ride this thing out. And why would you mess with something as effective as the Deuce McBride lineups that were carrying the Knicks home in the fourth quarter? And it was mostly defense

for him other than the third quarter, late third quarter where he hits a step back three, a baseline two, draws a foul. It's like, oh, okay, Deuce McBride, 7-0 run, just completely changed the game with Indiana's offense again, losing the plot just enough to give the Knicks some life. I want to go back to the turnaround heart thing. Yeah, please. Because one of the reasons that I would make that adjustment, at least part of the time, is they're toggling Halliburton between Hart and Bridges, and I'm trying to find a common

through line of like why he's guarding bridges sometimes and heart sometimes. I haven't found out what the coaching staff is thinking. Maybe it's random. I don't know. But if he's going to be guarding bridges, like if you're not hiding Halliburton on heart, I don't see any reason why you wouldn't put Turner on heart. Now, if you have to, if you decide I've got to hide Halliburton on heart all the time, that obviously takes away that card.

And Siakamontowns also means I can keep Neasmith on Brunson, which is like Brunson, Nemhart's great. He's a great defender. he's a great help defender. Brunson just, it's like he's not even there. I don't know what it is about that matchup, but Namhart is awesome against most of the league and against Brunson.

He just, he can't do it. So I'm leaning into that. By the way, for the record, for the year, for the playoffs, the Knicks with the two bigs on the floor are plus 28 and 120 minutes. In this series, just plus four in 30 minutes. What else are you watching for in game four, adjustment-wise, counter-wise, anything-wise?

One, this is a crackpot idea. I'm just throwing it out. there. As far as the question of where to put Tyrese Halliburton on the floor. I think we've seen with McAil Bridges too, and this might be part of the reason they've been yo-yoing that matchup a little bit is the Knicks have been pretty good about finding Mikhail for like little post-ups against Halliburton, specifically when they're playing smaller, like when Cat is the five. If the Knicks are going to start big again, Mitchell Robinson and a cat on the floor, I don't think putting Halliburton on OG Ananobi is the craziest thing

I've ever heard because OG is going to be glued to that corner. is going to be on the perimeter. Now, are the Knicks willing to reroute their entire offense to feed O.G. and Ninobe on the block against Halliburton? Maybe, but maybe that's the kind of rerouting you might want if you're the Pacers. And I'm not saying they should do it. I'm saying it's worth throwing up on the wall and investigating and having a conversation about. I think it's a great call.

Because he was on O.G. and O.O.D.O.O.B. early in the game in that alignment. And I wrote down immediately or I typed out immediately. Like, they got to find a way to exploit that. And maybe you're right. Maybe that's actually the wrong answer. Maybe that's the low-hanging fruit that Pacers want you to take. But I don't even think it needs to be post-ups, and it's harder to post anybody up when Mitchell Robbins is on the floor

because the help defenders there. Could be running him off pin-downs. It's just like I'm making him work. Somehow I'm making him work, and I'm using that size advantage as much as I can. For the Pacers, you know, the non-Halliburton minutes are getting dicey. They're plus 12, plus 12, rather, with Halliburton minus 10 without it, which is not bad, but I do think,

I don't know where the line is. Right now it's like, I kind of want the way Mathrin's playing, like they have these lineups where it's like Halliburton and four bench guys. And like, that's just not enough juice around Halliburton. And ditto for like Siakum and even if it's three bench guys and one other starter. Like I think it's funny because the Pacers are such an egalitarian team.

Like last year, the takeaway was they're so deep. there's not as much difference between their starters and their bench, which is both good and bad. Like it spoke to maybe they need one more high-end talent in the door to truly, truly contend, but also depth is good. It feels like the gap between the starters and the bench is a little wider this year than it was last year. And as a result, like, the line for me is like over under two and a half starters on the floor at all times, and I kind of want it to be over.

Especially in the conference finals. Like, you can get away with that stuff in the earlier rounds. you can obviously get away within the regular season, but you've got to button up those minutes, and you have to protect these guys ultimately. I think, frankly, the minutes in which Tony Bradley and T.J. McConnell on the floor are on the floor together, just get them out.

Like, Tyreys Halliburton needs to be the point guard on the floor in those minutes. Ideally, you want Siakam out there too. Like, Tony Bradley is a huge concession to put out there. If you're going to do that, you need to have offsetting offense. So I think there's a lot of small ways they can sort of rejigger the rotation to make things like that happen. they are harder within this game when Aaron Eismith leaves in the third quarter

with the ankle sprain. Yeah. And when Andrew M. And that, thank God he came back. Because by the way, the fact that in the year of our basketball gods, 2025, the Indiana Pacers crowd is chanting Aaron Neesmith to like lift his spirits. Yeah. It's just what a nice playoff moment

that was. Despite the, I mean, it was injured. So it's not nice. But like, that he has become worthy of such love from great fan base is awesome. It's absolutely awesome. And this is the conundrum of the Pacers, though. You know, the Knicks have their own relative identity crises at times that they have to deal with with Jalen Brunson and Kat not being the defenders you might want them to be.

And like, do you want them on the floor here? How do you use them here? How do you protect them? For the Pacers, it's kind of the opposite problem, which is what makes them so good is that they don't really have specialists. They just have good role players who can do lots of different stuff. And you neutralize that when you nuke their momentum, right? the movement, the playmaking, that collective

overall sense of of dynamicism that they bring. And really what the Knicks did in the fourth quarter down the stretch of this game was they stalled out all of that stuff to a degree that it just became Pascal Seaccom attacking mismatches and Tyreys Halliburton occasionally getting some jumpers against the drop. That was really the entire

pacer offense. And then desperation shots that were laid in the clock. Those were the three categories. And if that's the case, the Knicks are going to win because Jalen Brunson and Kat are better at doing those exact things than Pascal Seacquan and Tyrese Halliburton are, you need the collective movement. You need the collective juice to make it all work.

And Halliburton is the best player in the league at creating that and engendering that among a team. But it's, you know, you take away the transition play, you guard the screens a little bit more effectively, you make your defense a little bit more watertight, and then all of a sudden it's Aaron Neesmith bailouts against O.G. and Ninobe, and your possessions are going nowhere. You mentioned Halliburton against the drop.

And it's so interesting the contrast between two of the star point guards in this round. Shea Gilders-Alexander and Halliburton. Shea-Gillers-Alexander versus the drop is like, we're going to talk about this series briefly, but like Minnesota's entire defense is geared around take mid-range shots. And Oklahoma City is like, cool, we have the best mid-range shooter in the NBA. You're going to have to tweak that a little bit or you're dead. the Knicks, both last playoffs and this playoffs, they want to turn Tyrese Halliborne into a dribbler.

That's what they want. You will never see them or almost any other team blitz Tyrese Halliburton because that is just going to get the machine moving and the passes moving and that's what you don't want. They want Tyrese Halliburton dribbling, like trying to get a guy on his hip, doing the kinds of stuff that other point guards, like that's where they're most dangerous. And Tyrese Halliborne is still dangerous. made a couple floaters last night. He made a step back two.

He hit one off the glass. But they want to turn him into a dribbler in traffic and make him almost go against his nature as a score. And it's interesting to watch. Can we do a segment about old men yelling at clouds? I mean, I would love nothing more. Okay. This is presented by Abe Simpson, old man yelling at clouds,

sponsored by The Simpsons. Miles Turner attempts at three. With 23 seconds left, I think the Pacers are down two last night at that moment, right? Is that right? Am I, yes? No. Yeah. Yeah, they're down by two points.

The possession starts with Tyreys Halliburton drawing a switch of Mitchell Robinson, driving Mitchell Robinson, and then U-Turning, we're going to have to call this like the Tyree's turn. And then it ends up in Miles Turner missing a three. And I saw some, after the game, I like to check a box score, sip a glass. glass of wine, look at my notes, look at what the world is saying about the game, smart people that I like to follow. And there was some angst about once again, a team down two, a shoes, a layup for a three. Did you have any problems with that shot by Miles Turner and that process of that possession?

That U-turn, you're talking about the U-turn in this game, right? Not the game two you turn. Not the crazy one where I almost, I think, died and then was resurrected. Yeah, the game two U-turn is. almost a separate thing, because once you saw the different camera angles, Tyrese actually loses control of the ball on his drive, which makes sense why he would then U-turn. This one did bug me a little bit.

And I don't hate it, because we've seen what happens when other guards drive on Mitchell Robinson. Like, it doesn't always go great for them. And frankly, he's blocked Tyreys Halliburton on drives in this series. It's not something that's out of Tyrese's mind. I'm cool with it within the flow of the offense. I think what the reason it bugged me was within the greater complexion of this game. I thought Halliburton was a little too passive.

I thought there were moments where he should have been taking shots overall. And so then when you're stacking on top of that, doing a physical U-turn to take yourself out of the lane, conceptually, I understand it. Like you're pulling Mitchell Robinson out. You're throwing the next defense for a loop. You're doing all the things that the Pacers usually do so effectively. But instinctively in the moment, I have to admit, it did bother me a little bit. Interesting.

It didn't bother me in the moment. And it still doesn't really bother me now. Tell me about it. So I rewatched a couple of times this morning. So he beats Mitchell Robinson off to dribble. Now, as you mentioned, Mitchell Robinson is very tall and very fast. Yes. He gets into the lane and Siakum is cutting across the paint and he's in the paint,

which means O.G. Ninobe is now in the way. O.G. Ninobe steps up into Tyrese Hallibarton's driving path. Yeah. And that's why the U-turn happens, I think. And O'GNNobie is like a big scary guy. And if you slow down a little bit, well, the other big scary guy is coming from behind.

Now, is there a moment where maybe there's a drop-off to Siakum underneath the rim for a layup? You freeze it at the right moment, and it looks like there is. But if that pass has made Mitchell Robinson is veering over to Pascal Seacom, it is going to be a pain. I didn't love it, but I didn't hate it. If it goes in, I don't think, obviously, no one is complaining about it at all. It did not go in. So we disagree a little bit there. That's okay.

I'm not yelling at the cloud. You can still yell at the cloud. I will stand on the cloud, and you can, You can yell at me from down below. I'm happy to be it. Normally I will, like with the Celtics in those Knicks games where they're, hey, we're up 25. Let's take a three with 18 on the shock clock.

And like no one under the basket. It's like actually, maybe you should take a two. Maybe you should take a one. Just get foul and take a one. That's good enough. There was even more like I had Nick fan. This is the best part about living in the New York metro area when the Knicks are finally good. All my buddies who don't really follow the NBA very closely.

are texting me just scorching takes throughout the game. And so I pick up my phone after the game, and it's just, just scorcher after scorcher. Like, Tibbs is done. Like, they're just awesome takes. They all hated the Brunson shot.

Down two. They're down two in that circumstance, right? In game two, the quick long three you're talking about. The quick long three, which I rewatched this morning. I want to get the timestamp exactly right. So bear with me.

Here it is. Neesmith makes, Oh, they're, you know, Neesmith makes two free throws to put them up three. So the pages are up three. Brunson runs up the court and launches a three with 9.9 seconds left over a decent contest from New Smith. It misses Turner fouled on the rebound game over. Did you have a problem with, and I got like terrible shot, awful shot?

What are they thinking? What did you think of that shot? This one did not bother me so much. I get the time complaint. Like you have some to work with here. I would say for the New York Knicks offense, more time is not always good. This is a team that we've seen Jalen Brunson,

in some of these situations included, get trapped at the wrong time, have a huge defender in his face and be unable to get off, especially when you need a three specifically. I was okay with it. It's a clean enough shot in a crucial situation for a great pull-up shooter.

And so I'm okay with that. I don't think you're ever going to get a great look under those circumstances. Could he have taken a little more time to try to find something sure, but I'm just not sold that that would have been a better outcome. My friends are wrong. That was a fine shot.

There's nothing wrong with that shot. Down two, that would have been a questionable shot. Down three, like, you may not, what is the thing? Perfect is the enemy of good? You don't have time to search for perfect. Like, that's a good shot. Down three, they've clearly made a decision they're not going to foul you. You might not get a better shot than that.

The previous possession, which ends in a Josh Hart layup to cut the lead to one with 14 seconds left, they dribbled the air out of the ball for damn near the entire shot clock in that possession down by three. I had actually, even though they scored, I had much more of a problem with the process of that possession than I did Brunton taking that three. That concludes old man yelling at Cloud. We had a lot of big picture topics teed up for this in the event of a Pacer's win. The Pacers did not win. We're going to table those for another day. Any parting thoughts on this series as we move to a super, a super.

exciting game four in Indiana. I mean, I fucking love it. I love the chaos that this series has now presented. I love that we have, you know, there's no such thing as a normal Knicks game. There's no such thing as a normal Pacers game. There's certainly no such thing as a normal Nix Pacers game.

Like, this is just what it's going to be, and I'm here for it. This episode is brought to by eBay. You guys know that watching basketball is my thing, obviously, but you know what else is? Collecting basketball memorabilia. And that's why you got to love eBay. It's like a never-ending merch store,

vintage basketball cards, old school jerseys. one-off fan-made artwork. On eBay, you can always find whatever your thing is. From our collectibles and vintage cars to designer fashion, it's all there. Millions of finds, each with a story. eBay, things people love. This episode is brought to you by Adobe Firefly,

the all-in-one creative studio with AI-powered image and video generation. Built for today's creative process, Firefly helps you generate, edit, and experiment fast, because the asks aren't, getting smaller. And the timelines? Ooh, yeah, still tight. With all the best creative AI models in one place, Firefly brings your ideas to life. Learn more at adobe.com slash Firefly. All right, time for a little MLB interlude. One of the very last things I wrote at Grantland and I didn't want to write it and thank God I did was what it felt like in 2015 living in Queens as a lapsed.

Mets fan as the Mets with what Mike Francesa, I'll never forget driving in the car called the best young pitching staff he's ever seen in his life made the World Series and then lost to the Kansas City Royals. Can't get mad at that. One of my best friends from college. Shout out, Kevin is a big Royals fan. Can't get mad at a small market team ever winning the World Series in baseball. And just what it felt like being out after the Mets, I mean, most people who listen to this probably know, I was an absolutely insane Mets fan. my entire life until maybe age 25, 26, when life just kind of got in the way, I became an MBA writer and when you're fully invested in one sport, just becomes a little harder to put your

emotional frame of mind into another sport. It becomes a harder sell to your family. Like, hey, I watch basketball 10 months a year all the time. I'm going to watch baseball now. Then you have like a marriage and a kid and all your time just disappears. and you blink your eye and before you know it, you don't even know who's on the team anymore. And then they're in the world series. You live in Queens. People all around you're wearing Met stuff,

and you're like, oh, I don't even know who these pictures are. Syndegar, the guy with the hair, I don't know who that is. Terry Collins shopped at my same grocery store in Queens, and I had no idea, just no clue. College me would have been ashamed. And in that piece for Grantland in 2015, I wrote just my advice to younger sports fans as you get older. don't lose touch.

Life's going to get in the way. Life's going to complicate your fan. You're not going to be able to just be like, I'm carving out three hours a night now to watch the Mets every single night, to watch your team every single night, which is what I did. I watched every single Mets game when I was home. Everyone die hard. Insane.

I've said before on this podcast, if the baseball gods had come to me before the Subway Series in 2000 and said, we will allow the Mets to win if you let us with no anesthesia, chop off your right thumb. I would have been like, cool, I don't need it. Like, I'll take the win. And I said in that piece, don't lose touch. It's like check the box score every day.

Even if that's all you do, check the box score. Have it on in the background for an inning. Go to one game. Just be in touch so that when your childhood team hits the top again, you're invested. You feel like you're part of it because God damn it hurt to be out. And guess what? I didn't take my own advice in that piece.

And I continued to be out of touch with the Mets and just didn't know who was on the team. Didn't take my own advice. Didn't invest. Didn't check box doors. Didn't do anything. And then I got laid off from ESPN on September something, 2024. Right as the Mets were unbeknownst to me becoming like, I guess the feel good story in baseball. They had little fun acronyms.

They had signs. They had theme songs. They had Timmy trumpet. they had grimace, like just a lot was going on. And then I thought, you know what? I may be out, but I can come back in because I got nothing to do. I got nothing to do. And it came back so easily.

Alonzo hits that home run against the Brewers. I'm screaming in my house. I don't know Pete Alonzo from anything. I've missed this whole goddamn career. I don't know half the players on the team, but I'm in. And I made a vow, and I've talked about this on the podcast, during that time, I'm going to actually take my advice this time. I'm going to check the box score.

I have a TV in my office right over here. If it's the A thing and it's close, I'll pop it on in the background. At the very least, I'll pop it on in the background. I can pause King's Pistons and just look over and just, oh, okay, that guy's in the game. I like him. Bady, baddie? How do I pronounce his name? I like him.

I'm going to be in. And then about a month ago, I went to a fundraiser for the YMCA. And there was a silent auction. and one of the items on the silent auction was four tickets behind home plate for Mets Dodgers on May 24th, which was two days ago. And I looked at the bid. The bid was like, you know, anything of that nature is going to be a considerable out of money. I'm like, I'm going to make the minimum bid. It's going to be the first bid or I'm going to make the minimum bid.

And I knew that it was going to be a Western Conference Finals game. And I was like, there was part of my soul that was like, I don't know, I can't. What if, what if, you know, Shagel's underscores 70 points and Bill wants to go live on a podcast? or who knows what could happen. I was like, you know what, stop. Just bid on it and see what happens. No one else bid. I won.

I totally forgot about it, had some drinks, played some charity poker, woke up the next morning. He was like, oh, that's right, the auction. I won the auction. So Saturday night, four tickets. I took my dad, who's 82 years old and is an even crazier baseball fan, not a Mets fan. He's a Red Sox fan.

I wanted to be a Red Sox fan. I wrote about this for Grantland when I was a little boy. And my dad said to me, I don't think you should do that. It's going to be a life of pain for you. And this was before the 1986 World Series, which really divided our house. And he just said, you know, look, I would suggest maybe the local National League team, your mother's from Pittsburgh, maybe pirates, just not the Yankees, can't do the Yankees.

So I became a Mets fan. The Mets became awesome and won the World Series, deep playoff runs. Then they were bad for a while. We'll get to that. So I took my dad, my wife, who thinks she's been to one baseball. game, but she's from Europe. Baseball is just like not a thing there. And my daughter, who's never been to a baseball game, four tickets, fifth row,

Otani is 15 feet from us. And my God, first of all, I want to thank the Mets because I hit some of their PR people say, hey, I don't know if anyone cares about the NBA, but I'm coming to the game. They let us go on the field before the game. I got photos of us on the field, not on the field field, just like behind home plate. And then Zach Weber, one of their PR guys, left for a second. I was like, hold on for a second.

Comes back with a ball that Soto had hit during batting practice, gives it to my daughter, along with a cup full of like chunks of gum, wrapped up chunks of gum for her. And she said, well, I'm more excited about the gum than the ball. I said, get excited about the ball. Now she's excited about the ball because she saw Soto, she saw Soto hit a ball off the right field wall with the bases loaded.

She thinks Soto's awesome. She has the ball. She's a Mets fan forever. Thank you to the Mets. That was such. a special experience. And I was like just right back into it. Like Diaz comes in, the trumpet song playing, the lights are out.

I'm standing up. He mows through bets. He mows through Freeman. I'm doing the punchout sign in the fourth row. I can hear the guys behind me who are season ticket holders and they're just diehard. They're talking about like, well, you know, you know, Bady went two or five last night. I really think he's coming on and, you know, oh, Viantos is going to pinch him today. I think, you know, blah, blah, blah.

This dude, I can't remember his name. got called up from the minors. He was doing this in the minors. And the community aspect of it got to me. Like, these guys are clearly at every game. And I was like, you know, never going to buy season tickets. I'm certainly can't afford season tickets here. But I like the idea of just being part of it again.

And it's just like, now that I've seen it up close, I feel part of it again. And it just like, again, this is a team that when I went to college, I came back. I watched every single game. They're like a lot of kids that go to college, you lose touch with their high school friends, the Mets and like Ray Ordonias and in Garo Alfonzo. I was like super emotionally invested in Rick Reed making an all-star team. John Olerud, you're the most underrated player of your generation. Like those teams, I lived and out lighter.

Every freaking three two count was sweaty ass out lighter, lived and died with it. And then I lost touch with it. The team like became actually meant something to me. They're the only team really in my life that actually meant something to me. And now they mean something to me again. I'm never going to be a diehard like that. But I took my own advice. And that is what I'm urging all of you to do.

Take the advice that I didn't take. thank you to the Mets for an awesome experience for my family. They won the game, five to two. No home runs. My daughter really wanted to see the Apple go up. So that means we have to go again. But just let's go Mets and take the advice that I didn't take for myself. And thank you to the Mets was awesome.

That's where you're major league baseball interlude for today. Back to the regular schedule programming. This episode is brought to you by Amazon Prime. Ever get hit with a plan out of nowhere and need something ASAP? maybe it's an impromptu basketball game, a last minute trip with the crew, spontaneous date. That's when Prime's same-day delivery comes in. Get whatever you need, deliver it to you fast,

so you can say yes to the moment. Same-day delivery, it's on Prime. Visit Amazon.com slash Prime to find millions of items delivered fast. Available in select areas, terms apply. Okay, let's talk briefly because the series resumes tonight. Wolves Thunder. By the way, let's just enjoy this moment. It's 10.57 a.m. Eastern time.

The margin in the Eastern Conference Finals after three games is Indiana plus two. The margin in the Western Conference Finals after three games is Minnesota plus one. Let's just live in this world. Minnesota is like plus one, plus it. It literally can't get any closer than that. I guess both series could be plus or minus one. So it could get a little closer. I had OKC and six before the series.

I honestly like going into game three, I was a little bit worried the thunder we're just going to run the table for the rest of the playoffs. I was waiting to see like, will Minnesota respond? Woo! Did they respond?

Holy hell. Give me one thing you're watching for tonight in game four or one, maybe one thing, really anything, but I'm curious, what did you see there that was sustainable going forward?

Sustainable is an interesting. word. Because yeah, I think the variable in this series, as it often is with the Thunder defense, is like, are the opposing role players hitting their shots or not? And getting those makes from guys like Nas Reid, from guys like Mike Conley, from guys like, you know, Jaden McDaniels from the corner, like those are so critical to cracking the Thunder defense. Is that what the home road splits are going to be in this series? Is that those guys catching on in a meaningful way that's going to even travel with them to OKC when they go there for game five? to what extent are those players going to be involved offensively?

Because the wolves desperately need them to hit those shots. They need the one passaway three to be a thing that is a reliable weapon for them if they're going to compete. And I'm hopeful it will be enough so that we'll get a long series out of this. Yeah, I mean, look, you're not going to get a lot of clean, clean threes against the Thunder. But like, what did you actually, this is one thing I wanted to talk to you about. You know, I mentioned after game one, I think, of this series. how you can look at the numbers. I made a shooting luck joke on Simmons podcast.

Like, oh, congratulations, the wolves probably won, the shooting luck, the shooting quality game and game one. Actually, they didn't. I went to the tracking data and they didn't. And Mike Connolly talked between games two and three, I think, about how, yeah, the way they close out and defend, a lot of those shots are rushed. And I mentioned on Bill's pod, like,

not even the ones that are not against closeouts necessarily that are just regular pick and roll threes. A lot of them are coming early in the shot clock and from long distances. And I think the mindset underneath that is like, this may be the best we can do in this possession against this team. Like let's get let's get it up. So I was wondering just sort of where you stood like Oklahoma City is becoming the new Boston where every year teams shoot way below expectations on lots of threes. Yes. And it's carrying into this playoffs. And I'm wondering how you as a smart viewer like a portion credit and blame or whatever for that phenomenon.

Well, I think we've seen this enough. And look, it was pretty well investigated in Boston's case. And it's been pretty well investigated in OKC's case. We know enough to know that these teams are not just funneling possessions to the worst shooter on the floor. Like Oklahoma City gives up a lot of threes to a lot of players, including really good shoots, including some of Minnesota's best three-point shooters. And yet the swings are what they are. I give the Thunder a lot of credit still

for two things. The first is the close-outs you just described. I thought Mike Conley is a great, like, totem for that idea because he looked incredibly rushed, trying to score in any capacity against the Thunder defense. They are one of the best close-out teams in the league, one of the most aggressive close-out teams in the league. Just because you wind up taking a spot-up three

doesn't mean J-Dub or Alex Caruso isn't flying out at you, and that's not going to speed up your process. That's a huge part of it. I also think OKC's interior defense is so stifling that it pressurizes all of those shots. I don't care how open it is. When your team hasn't hit a shot in six minutes because the Thunder keep turning you over and getting out on the break, that's a tough shot to hit for any player, but especially for a role player. And so I think all of those compounding effects are why you see those numbers the way they are.

And ultimately, they still credit to the Thunder, even if it's technically or by tracking data a wide open or a very open shot. Yeah, I think, look, to put it very simply, the open ones that look like ones that are open against normal defenses, which you get fewer of against the Thunder, like the pick and roll, kick to the corner, a good shooter's wide open. Yeah. You're going to have to make those at like a 40 to 50% rate to beat the Thunder. If you, if you don't make enough of those, you're just not going to win. And then you're just going to have to make enough contested difficult threes. And Ant made a bunch, like those wins. Windows and ants working with on pull-up threes on the pick and roll are very small windows.

Unless there's a breakdown, which there rarely is, he's just going to have to make, this is the burden of being a great player is you're just going to have to make maybe a couple more than expectations over the next two games for this to be a real series. Same with Randall. It's awesome that Randall beasted Case and Wallace in the Post. And by the way, didn't hesitate at all in doing so. Catch, spin, go. When he got Shay, same thing.

He's also just going to have to make a few tough ones against him. Jalen Williams because the entire Thunder defensive scheme is based on Jalen Williams being able to guard Julius Randall so that Chet Holmgren can be anywhere but on Julius Randall and really at the basket being very tall. Yeah. And like it's it's tough sledding. Jill Williams made all defense, right? I think he did.

He made a second team. It's just he's just really good and really strong. And Julius Randall, the burden of being a great player is you're just going to have to make like three fadeaways a game against really good defenders. that's just the reality. I thought just interesting, the Thunder Big Man rotation is maybe my favorite little subplot of this series.

Yeah, Jay Will Back for GameBah. Did not understand why that happened? I went back and looked at the fouls. I was like, did I miss some fouls? I didn't, did you, was there a reason for that in your mind? Like, I didn't get it at all. I wasn't sure. It seemed like maybe there was some tradeoff

with some of the Ken Rich Williams a minute, but I kind of liked the Kenrich Williams minutes before, so I'm not really seeing what happened there. Yeah, I thought the Thunder really had their rotations figured out in this series like and where Chet should be. And it should either be both of the big guys, which is, by the way, not been awesome in the playoffs. Hartnstein and Holgren together for the entire playoffs,

zero scoring margin plus or minus whatever zero, Wow. Including in this series, also exactly zero. But I thought they had a nice feel of like either both of them are on the floor or one of them's on the floor, or when the wolves go to lineups that do not have Gobert and do not have McDaniels. So those are the two places where they want Chet to be. When neither of those guys are on the floor, when it's Nas Reed and Randall and three other guys, shooters, guards, you can play five out.

You can play five wings, none of the big men switch everything. And then Jalen Williams comes into the fold. I'm like, I don't know like, what's happening? Why is he here? Because I thought they just had a nice sort of mix of lineups, and I didn't get that. And everyone's talked about aunt being off the ball, going under on Shea now and then mixing that in, I thought was smart. I also liked, Shea will do this thing where against great defensive teams and Minnesota can be great, where he'll just run a pick and roll or get a matchup he wants, and he'll just dribble to like a dead zone.

on the floor, like 18 feet from the rim on the baseline where nobody really wants to be. But he's like, well, no help defender is going to be here and I'm Shay Gildj, Salkender, I can make this shot. And the wolves were like, actually we are going to send a second guy over here to get in your face. And I think it, and that's just like

their sheer effort and that's what you never know about these game three is. One team's playing for its life. One team's playing with a two-o lead. I can't wait to see what happens in game four. I still think the thunder are going to win the series, obviously. But who the hell knows? I think they will too. But I hope that I don't want to get too deep into the officiating conversation with this, but the wolves were allowed to defend with a greater level of physicality in game three

that changed the nature of that game, that changed the way that they're guarding Shea, that changed a lot of things. I hope that they're still allowed to do that because I want to see Shea crack that front. I want to see him deal with some of the pressure that he saw in game three on the ball, make some decisions out of the situations that might be complicated, that might be challenging to him to deal with the full freight of what the wolves present as far as a challenge goes. in part because I like seeing Ant do those same things. This is what we're in the playoffs for,

is to see the stars crack these kinds of puzzles. And I think, to Shea's credit, one of his greatest assets as a player, he's just one of the most determined drivers in the game. It doesn't matter if he's getting the calls or not. It doesn't matter what's happening around him. He is going to get into the paint, into the mix, toward the basket.

He's going to continue to do it. Ant doesn't always do that. And I think one of the big changes in game three was some of the determination to turn that corner, no matter how many defenders were in front of him and he's athletic enough to get around guys despite that that was I thought just a huge sea change

in the execution of Minnesota's offense and overall how aggressive Ant was looking to attack when he's the kind of player who if a couple possessions don't go his way on a drive if he doesn't get the whistle he thinks he deserves he'll just start jack like jacking three's he'll start doing other stuff on the perimeter

in a way that can still be good but I want to see both those guys in attack mode One of the ant's quirks that I really like is, and I'm not being facetious, I actually do think it's funny, is you mentioned not getting calls. He, you know, the rim mics are so good now that you can hear everything. Yeah. And so his go-to and he drives and he feels like he's fouled and he doesn't get a call is just, hey, ref! Hey, ref! And I watched the games and I laugh because, like, if I'm a ref, I mean, like, do I want him to refer to me by my name?

Oh, yeah. Like, is, is, hey, ref good enough for me? Like, am I going to be angrier at him? It's just, it's constant. Hey, right. And often he's right. Like, he's drawing a lot of content. He does.

He's just always, hey, ref. And I just one of my favorite things about it. If I weren't to be a referee, I would not want anyone to know my name. I would want a referee in a mask in complete anonymity. I just, I want to be out of the national discourse. I don't want any part of it. We know too much about each other in general, but we definitely know too much about NBA referees.

So it's, it's, but then you don't get to have your moment at the replay center table where you get, you know, some of these refs. It's true. Kennedy. I'm just going to leave that to Bill. Like, Billy is the Michael Jordan of that exact presentation. Why am I trying to jump the line? We should actually, you know what?

We should hire like an intern whose entire job it is is to compile those. And then we should have like an Oscars at the end of the year. So like here are the nominations for best replay center dialogue by a referee in a leading role. And just, you know, give out, just have the clips and give them out. Because some of them, you can tell, they're hamming it up. I mean, this is like, this is my moment. I got my, I did arm day yesterday in the gym. I'm going to make sure the biceps are out.

You know, it's just delightful. Any other thoughts as we go into game four? Any parting thoughts on wolves, Wolfs Thunder? I'm trying to think of like what are the other tensions in this point or in the series would be at this point. I mean, I'm blown away by the wolves, clearly. Like any, any win like that against the thunder is a substantial achievement. I'm still eager to see that kind of interplay of the bigs that you described.

I thought one of the reasons if we're going to get into the J-Will part of that and why he's in the series, they did post up Nause a couple of times to some effect against smaller players. And I wonder how much of it was like, Nas isn't hitting threes and we don't want to, we don't want him to allow him any running water. And so we don't want him to be able to take someone down low and bully them inside in a way that he might Kenrich Williams or might a wing or a smaller player. and so maybe we throw another big out there just because.

But Nas is the kind of player who can sort of twist this matchup a little bit. His ability to, whether he's hitting threes or not, put the ball on the floor and attack, and whether he can successfully get through the Thunder defense or not unscathed enough to get a shot at the rim, to me it's like a not insubstantial X factor in this matchup overall. Well, I mean, just, you know, Nas showing some life, making some shots. It helps. Devenzhenzo Alexander Walker. Naz reads six of nine on threes plus a lot each that'll do is is big and you know we didn't

mention terran shenan like four really consequential minutes in the first half and then lots of garbage time uh but but it's a fun i'm just glad for at least a little while we get some fun because look i'm not not to spoil any future episodes but one of the talking points we were going to have in the event that this is a three oh series was does this Oklahoma city performance make you think lesser more of, particularly more of the Denver Nuggets. Yeah. Well, Minnesota's like, no, you don't get to have that discussion. How about we win by 42 points and have a plus one scoring margin after three games of the

Western Conference finals? Hold it for another day. Rob Mahoney, just the best. Thank you for waking up early and joining us on a Mahoney Monday. Group chat, group chat. I'm just going to say it's my favorite NBA podcast. It's my favorite. It's my favorite.

I still, I need to, so I, I'm dying to have Waz on. Please. My obstacle is, I don't think he's waking up as early as you are on the West Coast. That's true. But sometimes he's by coastal now a little bit. So you might, maybe if you catch him on an East Coast swing, it'll be more at Waz hours. Because he just, he just lets it fly. I need to know more about like, I'm listening to the podcast.

He's listening to a podcast about like geopolitics during an NBA game. I don't even understand how that's possible. his Instagram is full of Mets stuff, which is really good for me and wine. And I just, I just have a lot of questions, but I guess I got to get his schedule. But group chats, the best NBA podcast there is. Rob Mahoney is the best in the business. Thank you, sir. We'll talk to you soon.

Enjoy the games. Thanks, Zach. All right, that's it for us today on the Zach Lowe show. We will be back Thursday. God only knows what will have happened by Thursday morning. Hopefully, hopefully we have great series, great competition. I'm rooting for the underdogs now to make it as exciting as possible. Thank you today to Jesse, Jonathan, and Mike on the production.

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