09-01-2023, 03:09 PM
(09-01-2023, 01:46 PM)omahen Wrote: Australia was doubling Luka whole game. Green was basically never on an island with Luka. I don't think he was the (main) reason for limiting Luka. I wasn't left with an impression that he played game changing defense. Its not like Luka is draining huge amounts of energy from defenders when he doesn't have the ball. And Slovenia left other players to carry the ball on the other side. Besides, even though Luka took only 9 shots, he was still making his signature passes out of double teams
Josh picked up Luka full court every time that ball was inbounded to him, if you don't think running an isolated full court press every time down the floor is draining then I think we just disagree there. I also wasn't saying that Luka wasn't impactful, I'm saying Australia's strategy was to limit him as a scorer and take the ball out of his hands and Josh was a big part of that is all. Luka always makes the right play and tonight his team stepped up and made Australia pay.
I wasn't saying that he was playing game changing defense necessarily, I'm saying the game plan for Josh was to play POA defense on Luka full court until he crossed half court and the double came to force it out of his hands and make the rest of the team beat them and Slovenia executed great and won. His job was play hard defense then go stand in the corner, which will basically be his job next season too when he's playing with Luka and Kyrie.