01-09-2020, 01:45 PM
Still experimenting last night as one of Luka and Hardaway were always on the floor. In the first and third THJ sat early and then came back to play with four bench guys. It didn't work all that well as the team was -4 with this alignment at the start of the 2nd and -4 again at the start of the 4th. Denver has a good bench, so it is difficult to know if it was good competition or our bench missing Wright, but our starters beat their starters last night while our bench lost to their bench.
Powell deserves some positive acclaim for his effort last night. Second leading scorer and second leading rebounder again while holding his own against one of the best bigs in the game. Jokic was 2 of five in the first half with all of his time coming against Powell. Denver was -4 in the nearly 14 first half minutes where Powell covered Jokic. The third quarter was ugly, but go back and watch. Dallas was +2 when Powell subbed out at 7:20 in the third. Jokic had scored 5 points on 2/3 shooting when Powell subbed. Jokic absolutely rag dolled Maxi scoring 10 points in the five minutes Powell was out. Jokic hit two threes in the final two minutes of the third, one on Powell and one on Jackson (but Dallas was actually +1 during that time). In the fourth, Jokic was 1/3 and Denver was -1 with Powell on Jokic until the final shot. For the game Jokic was -3 and Powell was +6.
Please don't take this as anti-Maxi. Here's a really nice article from The Athletic that outlines how far he's come: https://theathletic.com/1515575/2020/01/...tial-game/
But Powell really doesn't deserve the snipes he's getting regarding last night. As to the final play, Denver game planned to switch off of Powell. The coach decides whether to play it straight up or to have someone double off of someone (Murray wouldn't have been the logical place to double from). The best passing big in the league has the ball 10 feet from the basket on a small guy and he is surrounded by marksmen. That was a low success rate scenario for Dallas no matter what. The issue came in our inability to score the final two minutes, not in defending the play Denver called.
One last thing...I've been consistent since the summer in saying we are too thin at C/PF to withstand any of KP/Powell or Maxi going down for a couple of weeks. At the very least, we should use some of our assets to put another big on the team to get us to and through this years playoffs.
Powell deserves some positive acclaim for his effort last night. Second leading scorer and second leading rebounder again while holding his own against one of the best bigs in the game. Jokic was 2 of five in the first half with all of his time coming against Powell. Denver was -4 in the nearly 14 first half minutes where Powell covered Jokic. The third quarter was ugly, but go back and watch. Dallas was +2 when Powell subbed out at 7:20 in the third. Jokic had scored 5 points on 2/3 shooting when Powell subbed. Jokic absolutely rag dolled Maxi scoring 10 points in the five minutes Powell was out. Jokic hit two threes in the final two minutes of the third, one on Powell and one on Jackson (but Dallas was actually +1 during that time). In the fourth, Jokic was 1/3 and Denver was -1 with Powell on Jokic until the final shot. For the game Jokic was -3 and Powell was +6.
Please don't take this as anti-Maxi. Here's a really nice article from The Athletic that outlines how far he's come: https://theathletic.com/1515575/2020/01/...tial-game/
But Powell really doesn't deserve the snipes he's getting regarding last night. As to the final play, Denver game planned to switch off of Powell. The coach decides whether to play it straight up or to have someone double off of someone (Murray wouldn't have been the logical place to double from). The best passing big in the league has the ball 10 feet from the basket on a small guy and he is surrounded by marksmen. That was a low success rate scenario for Dallas no matter what. The issue came in our inability to score the final two minutes, not in defending the play Denver called.
One last thing...I've been consistent since the summer in saying we are too thin at C/PF to withstand any of KP/Powell or Maxi going down for a couple of weeks. At the very least, we should use some of our assets to put another big on the team to get us to and through this years playoffs.