Topic: 2019 NBA Pre-Season - page 177. (Read 914528 times)

The trio of superstars in Minnesota has an overdue performance after failing to qualify for the second round last season's playoffs. Although they were also faced against last season's champions, the Denver Nuggets but they're not really doing well since they only finished 8th in the regular games last season. This season though, there were adjustments and the team chemistry are well built.

I favored the Wolves over Dallas without a doubt. The defense of the Wolves is something to worry and we will see how one of the best if not the best offensive player of the NBA together with veteran Kyrie Irving fares.

I think it is Minnesota against Boston in the finals. And finally, Boston's organic duo wins the crown.

It’s suicidal to YOLO bet with Dallas considering how great the defense and offense of Wolves. I wonder who will guard with Gobert and KAT properly on Dallas current line-up without removing Kyrie and Luka on their player on the court.

Both Kyrie and Luka will be a burden on defense if they can’t answer on offense while ANT will have the greatest day of his life free shooting or driving due to the space that Gobert and KAT give to him.

It’s a massacre to think that Wolves will play same energy level when they are against Nuggets. Maybe game 1 might be rest for Wolves but the rest of the match will surely overwhelming for Dallas.

For risk takers for sure Dallas will be the best option for them, and like what you mentioned,  it's not only Wolves who's got a good journey so far after beating the defending Champ but with how Dallas managed to blend the Players together and how both Luka and Kyrie managed their on-court relationships that's something that brings them to this far, it's the game between two promising squads the only thing that will separate them is to whom is much hunger and the one that will really put everything to win the conference finals and move to chase the world title Champ!

Well i fell sleep yesterday and i really think Denver was gonna win the last seven amtch against Minnesota Timberwolves, because they were winning in the early stages of the game and i think, well they recover their memory and are gonna be again the conference finals. Nothing of that happen when i wake up today i see they lost.

Exciting and scary. I am with the Dallas Mavericks here but when I watch how good the defense of the Timberwolves is, it makes me worry. Edwards has a better defense than Doncic but we have seen Doncic find his ways even with great defenders, in the case of OKC it was Dort, but the key player here might become Kyrie Irving again. If Conley is the one who will D him, he can probably take advantage of that mismatch in agility and talent at attacking the paint.
KAT will probably face PJ Washington because he became a threat too on both ends of the floor.
The under-the-rim protection though might be a good match Lively versus Gobert or Gafford versus Gobert. Those two big men of the Mavs had been showing great performances in their last series against the Thunder.

Dallas definitely has a great arsenal of scorers, and it is not double team type of thing anymore. Jokic was stopped basically because they had twin towers. However, Irving and Doncic are not pick and roll players, they are scorers from perimeter, and I think it would be quite possible for them to get a win. However, Wolves showed that their defense is so great that they could actually stop anyone, and I believe that we are going to really see them do quite well on offense as well.

It was a big shocker for me to see Wolves win, ANT really plays like a superstar, I did not expect him to be this good. The trio of Gobert-KAT-Ant ends up being something special out of nowhere, at the start of the season nobody would have guessed this.

It's a complete different team so the approach would be different. If we compare the journey of these two teams, yes the Wolves have the tougher journey and that's the reason why they are listed as the favorite to win the series. Odds for the series bet are as follows.

Dallas to win 2.34
Minnesota to win 1.61

So with that odds, we can tell that the Wolves are only a slight favorite, that's a respect to the Mavericks because they also have a great journey so far.

In order for Mavs to advance NBA Finals, I think also Luka needs a lot of his magic, even the amounts of we've never seen before. I respect Mavs but I agree with your points, yes they have more experience but who's gonna stop Edwards? Luka needs to be some legendary level, so much so that for years his legendary WCF performance must be talked about. I can't see a clear favourite but I am certain that Mavs's job is harder. Timberwolves defence stopped Nuggets at the end and won those 4 games, they might do the same to Mavs. In the beginning of this year and also in the beginning of playoffs, I didn't expect this much efficient Wolves. I can't see any reason why they can't get the title.

Good thing with Dallas is that they also have Kyrie irving to carry the team if  Luka would struggle. I just watch their previous match but that was before the trade deadline, and Dallas actually beat the Wolves in that game with Luka and Irving scoring. As to good teamwork, I think Dallas is a more balance team as what I've seen during the series against OKC, so if they'll be able to maintain that, I think they can beat the Wolves in 6 or 7.

Nuggets is already not easy for them and no one expect this will be the outcome of their campaign since they are the defending champ and people are so hype with them especially that they are still doing good this season. But unfortunately everything shift and Wolves take advantage on situation and advance to conference finals.

But I really don't think that they would get an epic comeback since Nuggets takes a huge lead at earliest quarter of game 7 also Edwards is struggling and its like they are already finish but they bounce back then show that they can do those impossible things and now they are facing Mavs which is also doing so good this season.

We cannot see Jokic and Doncic teasing each other inside the court since Wolves didn't let Nuggets to advance on conference finals.

Edwards added 16 points while shooting only 6 of 24 from the court

We watched an incredible match, what a great comeback. It is a great achievement to beat the last champion, it is great to lead in the last period and win the match in such a stressful match. If they play like this in the conference final, the Wolves will not have much difficulty, I think their strongest opponent is they managed to pass
 It was a very good match, we watched it like we were watching the final match

No one expected this match at the start of the playoffs and now that we're here, we can say that Mavericks is not that easy for the Timberwolves since they can play well and manage to adjust their play in the crucial moments of the game. They also have more experience than them but their problem right now is how they gonna stop Ant since they don't have a capable player to stop him right now except Luka will play and do his magic tricks again.

Yup, Dallas already improve their defense I think that young stars inside can work against the two towers of Minnesota, while the competitions between Luka and ANT that's something fans will closely be monitored, both are electrifying and really have that huge impacts with how the team will play the game, adding to that both are the future face of this league, hopefully that friendly competition will serve as good inspiration for both superstars to bring all in winning the confernece title and possibly take the world title.

2 road wins for tonight.
The Pacers successfully defeated the Knicks while the Timberwolves eliminated the defending champions, Nuggets on their own home.

I really thought that they have it already. I mean they have a double digit lead coming into the 2nd half, but they lost their momentum like you said in the 3rd quarter and from there, it's all Timberwolves. Edwards only scored 16 points, but the offense has been distributed towards other players. Compared it to the Nuggets who only has Jokic and Murray doing it all, and with the Timberwolves being one of the best defensive teams in the league currently, focusing the offense on 2 players is a no-no for them because they can just double team those players and shut them down. Well, Murray and Jokic scored 69 points but like what I said, that will not work against a defensive-minded Timberwolves.

As for the Pacers-Knicks, they did the classic "Reggie Jackson choke" at MSG . Anyway, I didn't watch the whole game (because I'm sleeping at that time), but the Knicks are undermanned and Brunson had his worst playoff performance scoring only 17 points. Is he injured at that time? Good game for the Knicks, and I wonder what will be their moves during the off-season.

Anyway, Celtics-Pacers in the East while Timberwolves-Mavericks in the West. What are your predictions? As for me, it will be Celtics in 7, and Timberwolves in 6 games.

I'm excited for this, but I think Dallas is not anymore an offense team because they have already improve their defense. Luka vs Edwards, and I'm not sure if the Wolves will still choose to play the 2 bigs together since Dallas loves to run and there might be a mismatch on the pace of the game. But let's see what would happen in game 1, this is a new series, hopefully another exciting match up that will bring us to game 7.

I watched the game from second half time rooting for wolves. During 3rd quarter, all the wolves were scared to shoot and Anthony Edwards didn't show up, but boy did he at end of 3rd quarter to fire up his team. Then 4th quarter, everyone from nuggets were scared to do anything except jokic. It was so funny when Braun hit a floater and try to fire up his team. Murray finally was able to gain some courage but it was a little to late. The entire nuggets folded under pressure while the wolves thrive on momentum.

So true.
That was actually a 30-point swing. Down by 20 and then up by 10. The Timberwolves showed a high level of defense by making stops and then coming back with great offense too. Honestly, I cannot see the Nuggets scoring the paint because of the Wolves Twin Towers. Even Naz Reid has a great defense against the Joker. If only they put KAT and Gobert in foul trouble earlier then they could've won that game because somehow Jokic could find a way to dominate the paint.

Why did the Nuggets lose?
Aaron Gordon was not effective. If you look at the stats too, AG had been the key player for the Nuggets to win their games. Whenever he scores and rebounds efficiently, there's no way the Wolves would win.

Still, a big round of applause to the Wolves. Next stop, Dallas. Offense versus defense once again. Let's see if that could still work against a strong team like the Mavs with twin towers too. It will be fun.

Looks like the Nuggets came up short for trying to exert a lot of effort playing defense in the 1st half. They have control over the game against the Wolves that they even had 20 points lead at some point in the 3rd quarter.
There has been a lot of interesting things going on with this series, one of the most noticeable is the Minnesota defense. Everytime they play good defense and held the Nuggets under 100, it is almost an automatic W for the Wolves. Look here :

I think this has been the key motivator for the Minnesota to beat the defending champs and these right here again is a living testament that defense win games.
The Pacers and Knicks had a pretty tight series as well, but I'd pick the Denver vs Minnesota as the best series of the year so far, simply because of how the Wolves have done so much this year and let alone in this series. We thought they're gonna lose this series, but a 20 points comeback in game 7 has never happened for quite a long time until the Wolves just finally did it today.
Moving forward, I think we have another interesting series ahead for both conferences.

Nuggets unable to play good defense in the 2nd half, they had the momentum already and I can't believe they allowed the Wolves to come back and beat them. Well, I guess Jokic vs Luka two friends are not really destine to face each other in the WCF, we now have the Dallas and Wolves.

The streak continues, now its 6 NBA season where NBA champions have not advance in the WCF.

By the way, about the Knicks vs Pacers game, it's also the road game that win the game, and I heard this from one of the commentators.

"best shooting percentage in the NBA playoff history"

That's because the Pacers shoot 67.1%