Anthony Edwards & Timberwolves dominate Clippers, Russell Westbrook struggles | Hoops Tonight

Anthony Edwards & Timberwolves dominate Clippers, Russell Westbrook struggles | Hoops Tonight

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So you guys don’t miss any of our content over the course of this season all right let’s talk some basketball you know I thought the story of Timberwolves Clippers was Rudy gobear not just in his help defense responsibilities but also in when they shifted him onto Russell

Westbrook some of the damage that he did to the Clippers offense overall this is the eighth time this season that Rudy gobear had at least 15 points in four blocks in a game had some really impressive offensive plays in the second half at a pick and roll possession where

He caught on the roll and Euro stepped around zubach on his way to the basket he had a cut underneath the front of the rim on a baseline Anthony Edwards Drive where he caught and kawh Leonard stepped up into help and he just buried Kawai underneath the basket and dunked on his

Head was cleaning up the offensive glass too it was a really good two-way effort from Rudy goar but I want to focus in on the defensive end of the floor he spent a good amount of time on Russell Westbrook and just completely shut down the Clippers offense and one of the

Things that you’d see is kawhai like drive into the lane and see Rudy goar and instead of taking a layup have to take like some incredibly difficult left shoulder fade he actually made one that like was a straight up line drive that barely got over the front of the rim but

You’d see hesitation there there was a play where Paul George drove into goar goar was right there waiting for him he shoveled it off to kawhai Rudy just turns around he’s right there waiting for him and there’s they’re pump baking at ghosts they’re refusing to take shots

Around the rim he just completely and utterly dominated this game there was even one of the most impressive plays that you’ll see from a shot blocker a block of a hook shot zubac in the middle of the lane kind of went over to his over his left shoulder for a hook shot

In the lane and Rudy just swatted it out of there it was an incredible two-way performance from Rudy goar Jaden McDaniels did great work on kawhai Anthony Edwards did great work on Paul uh Paul George I thought Kyle Anderson had a key shift in the early fourth

Quarter cuz like one of the pathways of this game was as the matchups kind of shook out James Harden was playing pretty well in that early third quarter stretch just like hit a step back three made some good plays to get the Clipper or get to get the uh the wolves in

Rotation where the Clippers were able to get some easier shots because he had Mike Conley on him and then when he stepped out of the game and Russ came on there wasn’t really a good entry point anymore for the Clippers in their offense completely stalled and then when

James Harden came back into the game in the fourth quarter they put Kyle Anderson on him and he had a really good shift on him there to help them continue to grow the lead and then from there just really solid weak side rotations I thought nikel Alexander Walker had a

Couple of plays where he took away threes that would for sure be decent catch and shoot opportunities for guys like air coffee or Norman pal he’s chasing them off the line they held the Clippers to 0.9 5 points per spot up possession they average 1.13 for the season so almost a 20%

Increase they’re the second best spot up team in the league behind the Boston Celtics and they just completely shut didn’t shut down but did a significant amount of damage to that significant chunk of what the Clippers like to do on offense then on the other end of the

Floor Anthony Edwards had one of the best 1 for 11 from three games you’ll ever see he was seven for seven on twos all right at the rim analytics guys would have loved his shot charart it was just a bunch of threes and a bunch of layups and Anthony Edwards as we know

Will take mid-range shots just didn’t take any of them in this game had some unbelievable drives to the rim his physical inos in the G on the game makes it so that even against excellent perimeter defense teams like the Clippers he can just get to his spots he

Had this like pure weding spin move off of one leg where he got into the lane and teren Mann who a big physical guard was being physical with him and balling him up and taking the contact in the chest and he just powered through all of that and got

All the way to the rim and scooped it in with his right hand I I’ve talked a lot about this with the young players that I coach but like getting in the weight room and specifically leg strength is so incredibly important to get to your spots because when you’re fighting

Through contact every one of those bumps is like a battle and if you are the bigger stronger player you’re going to be able to it’s just simple physics you’ll be able to absorb that kind better than if you were the smaller player in those altercations and and

Don’t mistake the weight room and the role that plays in Anthony Edward’s ability to get to the rim he had eight assists and one turnover good job driving and kicking to Shooters one thing with him i’ I’ve harked a lot on Jason Tatum for this so I want to be

Fair he does have a tendency to settle for really difficult pullup three-point shots and he’s not particularly good at them and you know in general I I I pulled this out for the for that Tatum discussion but when you look at all the guys in the league that attempt over

Have attempted over 400 pull-up threes this year or pull-up jump shots this year all of them are guys that don’t have great physical tools and are great at that shot so they shoot incredible you know you know 52 53% effective field goal percentage so they’re getting over

A point per shot on it Jason Tatum and Anthony Edwards they take they both take almost half their shots in the form of Pull-Up jump shots and both of them are really inefficient as a matter of fact ant is worse with it even than Jason

Tatum is and so both of them you got to remember they’re kind of cutting the defense a break when they settle those kinds of shots because of how dominant they are Elsewhere on the floor again seven for seven when he went to the rim and one for 11 when he pulled from the

Perimeter so I’m being nitpicky here but like to see a little better balance there from Anthony Edwards again for both of those guys just cut it from half your shot diet to like a little bit under a third of your shot diet like 30% of your shot diet now you’re doing what

All of the Great efficient scores of all time do from the standpoint of not uh letting the defense off the hook really balanced scoring game from caddy at 24 points a little bit of everything was scoring out a spot up scoring on Cuts scoring on offensive rebound put back

Scoring out of the post scoring in ISO had a really impressive hockey assist in the second half where he was uh uh driving along the left wing I think he was driving on Terence man if I remember correctly but James Harden turns to double team and he re uh kawh Leonard

Made a perfect textbook windshield wiper rotation windshield wiper rotations is like when the double comes the other guy rotates with him to take away the first pass because the majority of players when they get double teamed panic and try to just make the quick Outlet pass rather than making the kill pass the

Pass that beats the defense and C just didn’t Panic pivoted back over his left shoulder read that Harden was kind of playing that passing Lane and that Kawhi Leonard had jumped up to Mike Conley whipped it across the court to Anthony Edwards on the uh right wing extra pass

I think Paul George wrote rotated up extra pass to the corner to Jaden McDaniels and he knocked down the three really really high level playmaking from Carl towns and then as a team they just completely dominated the Clippers in the paint outscored them 64 to 42 the

Clippers as I’ve talked about a lot this year they rely on pull-up shooting they take them the second most in the league behind the Dallas Mavericks and they’re 18th in points in the paint scored per game so they went one for 11 on pullup threes kind of mimicking Anthony ever’s

Number uh the Clippers as a team went 1 for 11 on pullup threes and 10 for 32 overall on pull-up jump shots they had 21 points on 32 pull-up jump shots what’s your next punch when that’s not working what’s the next thing that you can do and as you saw in that second

Half when James Harden came out and they had that long stretch with Russ and then when Harden came back in and he had a better perimeter defender on him it just they weren’t able to generate that driving kick offense that they can go to as an alternative to their pull-up jump

Shooting attack and like the the the Wolves to their credit like they only they’re a great three-point shooting team they only shot 32% from three they’re a bad spot up team when you chase them off the line but like that’s an important part of their game is the

Ability to knock down catch and shoot threes they weren’t shooting well right Anthony Edwards went one for 11 and they’re just good at doing other stuff they’re great transition team they’re a great postup team they’re one of the best teams in the league at scoring on offensive rebound putbacks a lot of

Stuff like what you saw from Rudy goar in that game so they can win ugly they can win when it goes 1 for 11 from three and win big cuz as we know the timber wolves biggest weakness is their late game scoring the stuff that they do offensively when it’s you know a

Three-point game with 5 minutes left that’s usually their biggest issue and they can win ugly and win big and not even have to put their offense in that sort of predicament really really impressive dominant defensive performance from the Minnesota Timberwolves again and like I I’ve been I’ve talked about this with the

Timberwolves I’ve been a little bit critical from the standpoint of their uh late game offense I want to be clear aside from the nuggets all of these teams have big red flags so whether it’s Boston in their offensive execution Minnesota in their offensive execution Milwaukee in their point of attack

Defense like the Lakers and their complete and utter lack of a point of attack Defender the Warriors and their lack of like a good veteran second option behind Steph Curry like all these teams the Thunder are super young and super small right like all of these

Teams have big red flags and so don’t mistake me being critical of the Wolves late game offense as me saying they can’t win that’s just if they lose that’ll be what gets them beat but there’s all these other teams that have similar flaws that could just get beat

For their own reasons if that makes sense on the Clippers front I talked about the entry points earlier James Harden on Mike connley that matchup piece is a big part of it I thought they stayed with Russell Westbrook way too long in the middle to late third and

Then into the fourth quarter and he had some disastrous mistakes there’s a play where he smoked a transition layup off the back of the rim which led to a wide open Anthony Edward Wards three which he missed but Rudy goar got an offensive rebound put back and one as a result of

Them being only five on four on the other end of the floor cuz remember I talked about this yesterday with Spencer dwood he smoking a layup especially in transition you’re gonna have a guard who’s typically responsible for being the first line of transition defense you’re going to have a guard behind the

Back of the backboard and that that’s always just going to put your defense in a compromised position but that’s a five-point swing smoked layup run out for Rudy goar and one Rudy and for the record Russell Westbrook shooting 51 something percent from from on layups this year he’s one of the worst layup

Shooters in the League this year and so when he when he takes uncontested layups in his spaced out environment he typically makes them but when he goes into traffic he misses them almost every time at this point and there was wide open kawh Leonard on the left wing on

This transition play that led to the five-point swing there’s a play where he caught in the right corner whipped by Rudy goar beat him on a close out and then tried to dunk it off of like straight vert which like 32-year-old Russ would have done just fine but at

This point in his career he can’t do anymore and it ended up being another run out that led to a foul and it was a four-point swing and then lastly there was about it was somewhat late shot clock it was like six or seven seconds on the shot clock but instead of

Swinging it to a better offensive player he tried to attack Rudy goar on an ISO who was clearly backpedaling and taking the rim away smoked Del lay up over the top and it went ran ran out the other way in Minnesota hit a three that’s a five-point swing a four-point swing and

A five-point swing off of three mistakes from Russell Westburg it was a 14-point swing all in that third quarter but even Beyond just those three plays with Rudy go bear on him the ball just kept ending up in his hands because again a lot of these offensive players they’re making

Instinctual plays like they’re used to driving and kicking a certain way when they are they’re programmed when they see a guy open wearing their Jersey to throw that ball especially as a guard especially a player of Russell Westbrook’s reputation but when the ball kept ending up in his hands that was

Usually where the offensive possession would fall apart and I thought tyou just stuck with him way too long in this game he had 29 minutes the Wolves uh were plus 21 when Russ was on the floor and it was an even game when he was off the

Floor and I saw a lot of Clippers fans talking about like oh they tried to go small not just Clipper fans but Clipper uh people watching the game like the Clippers tried to go small and they still couldn’t score and it’s like yeah they went small but they went small with

Russ when you go with small with Russ it’s effectively like having a center on the floor offens L A Center that’s going to struggle to finish around the rim so they’re small but they’re limited on offense when they go with that group and if you as as we’ve talked about so much

On this this show when you go small you better be damn good at being small or the big team is just going to demolish you because the big team has all of these advantages as well you need to pick them apart on offense if you’re going to be small and that’s not what

They did and then lastly on the Clippers front can they hold up against interior power teams after last last night 0 and2 versus The Wolves one- two versus Denver one- two versus the Lakers that’s two- six against the big front lines of the Western Conference and this has been a

Consistent thing I’ve talked about like like they’re a bad defensive rebounding team they rely on pullup jump shooting they don’t score in the paint those are significant concerns against traditional playoff powerhouses does it I still have the Clippers up at fourth in my contenders list I’m not taking them off

That list but like I talked about earlier with Minnesota if the Clippers lose this is how it will look it will look like them going cold from the perimeter in a physical kind of playoff like environment and getting dominated inside of the Paint

Jason Timpf reacts to Anthony Edwards, Karl-Anthony Towns, and the Minnesota Timberwolves’ dominant 121-100 win over Kawhi Leonard, Paul George, and the Los Angeles Clippers. Jason discusses Rudy Gobert and Minnesota locking down the Clippers’ high-powered offense, why Anthony Edwards can seemingly get wherever he wants on the court, and the massive struggles of Russell Westbrook.

Watch the full episode here: https://youtu.be/52pU5VGNzUk

Timeline:
00:00 – Rudy Gobert was story of the game
01:57 – Timberwolves shut down Clippers
03:21 – Anthony Edwards physically dominates
06:05 – Karl-Anthony Towns does it all
07:05 – Wolves dominate in the paint
07:56 – Timberwolves can win ugly
08:49 – Can Minnesota can overcome biggest weakness?
09:38 – Russell Westbrook massive mistakes
12:53 – Can Clippers take on stronger teams?

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