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NBA / NCAA Basketball

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Nomad

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BullsFan22 said:
As Shaq said a few times, the Heat play the same or similar way consistently, win or lose. They are not gonna have peaks and valleys in performances, they’ll be level most of the time, while the Celtics are the opposite. This series showed that. The Celtics are the more talented team, but they’re extremely stubborn with their 3’s. When you start a game 0-12 from 3, perhaps it’s a good idea to change the tactics a little bit and slow it down. They kept shooting and kept missing. Miami stayed level headed and did the job. Totally deserved series win. I was half expecting the Heat to wilt, but when they took a double digit lead in the 1st quarter I knew they weren’t gonna beat themselves and choke.

The Nuggets are a different beast. In many ways they’re quite similar to the Heat. They play team ball, they pass it well, they can run, play good defense and they have the best player in the league who already has 8 triple doubles in these playoffs, passing Wilt Chamberlain’s 7 in 1967.

It’ll be a tough series, even if it doesn’t go to 6 or 7.
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I don't think Miami has an answer for Jokic. 6-9 Bam Adebayo against 7 ft Joker? If Miami doubles down a lot on the Joker then he'll kill them with his passing finding the open guy.

FWIW, the Nuggets swept the heat 2-0 in the regular season with the Nuggets missing both Murray & Gordon in the 2nd game on the road.

Nuggets have had a solid starting 5 all season long. And Bruce Brown has been their #1 guy coming off the bench (averaging about 28 mins in the playoffs). It looks like Gordon with be matched up on Jimmy Butler - that'll be interesting to see how that goes (Gordon covered Lebron in the WCF).

It'll be interesting to see how these teams look on Thursday. The Nuggets will be coming off a 10 day rest - will they be rusty? The Heat, OTOH, left for Denver right after the Celtic win & get a measly 2 days to recover. How well will they look come tipoff time?

The Mile High City here as gone absolutely nuts with the franchise's first appearance in the NBA finals (my son, who's a huge Nuggets fan, is going to attend the outdoor watch party at Ball arena. Me...I'll just stay at home & enjoy it on my big screen. Lol).
 
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Nomad

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Great start for the Nuggets. Gordon taking advantage of the mismatches & scoring big in the first half. Heat was 3-0 in series openers all on the road - so first loss in game 1 of the playoffs.

Jimmy B was off target & needs to play much better if they expect to have any chance of beating the Nuggets. The whole team looked worn out & tired. We'll see if they can get it together & stay in the game on Sunday.
 
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Nomad

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Shocker in Denver - Miami steals one to even the series. The last time the Nuggets lost at home was back on March 30. The last time the Heat won in Denver was 2016.

Big adjustments made by the Heat that really paid off. They were proficient with the 3 ball hitting 17 out of 34. The Nuggets a total defensive breakdown giving up 36 pts in the 4th period! The Joker scores 41 but only 4 assists.

Great effort by the Heat - we've got a series now.
 
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Nomad

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Triple-double each for The Joker & Murray. Nuggets looked very aggressive from the get go. Great bench support in the 2nd half with rookie Christian Braun pumping in 15 on 7-8 shooting:

Christian Braun explodes off bench, emerges as unlikely hero in Game 3 | NBA.com

Christian Braun explodes off bench, emerges as Nuggets' unlikely hero in Game 3
www.nba.com www.nba.com

Must win for Miami on Friday - I don't think they want to go back to Denver down 3-1.
 
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BullsFan22

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Denver wins in Miami again, another double digit win. Gordon with 27. Nuggets up 3-1 now. I don’t see the Heat winning in Denver unless the Nuggets choke or the Heat have a perfect game. The refs tonight were terrible. It seemed like they were trying to keep Miami in the game, and they did for a bit, Jokić picked up his 5th foul (courtesy of a nice flop by Adebayo) in the 4th and Miami cut the lead to 5, but then it was all Denver, hitting some big 3’s and a ridiculous layup by Bruce Brown.
 
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Nomad

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Aggressive defense holding the Heat to under 100 pts for the 2nd time in the series. As pointed out - great game by Gordon. And 21 pts by Bruce Brown off the bench seeing almost 30 mins of action.

Sellout crowd last night at Ball arena for the watch party (my son attended & said it was absolutely crazy with the screaming crowd, the cheerleaders, the mascot & halftime show).

The stage is set for the championship on Monday if the Nuggets don't play poorly & let Miami steal another one. We'll see how much fight Miami has left.
 
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BullsFan22

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Nuggets win what was likely their most difficult game of the playoffs. They were awful from 3, couldn’t really get in any rhythm but got second chances from their rebounding advantage and played good defense. Deserved champions. Jokić clearly the best player of the playoffs and was robbed of the regular season MVP. The WCFMVP and FMVP made up for it. Considering their age and contracts, the Nuggets should contend for titles for 4, 5 seasons. Injuries is what held them back with this core in recent seasons, otherwise I think they would have won it earlier.

The Heat were not expected to get to the finals this season but they ground it out. They need to get a big or two.
 
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Nomad

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Congrads to the Nuggets for getting it done & bringing the Mile High City it's first NBA title! Really not much of series though when you look at how outclassed Miami was & couldn't match up very with the Nuggets (in all fairness to Miami, it probably would have been a closer series had Herro not gotten hurt as he averaged 20 pts per game coming off the bench).

Nuggets blew through the playoffs at 16-4 (one of the best playoff runs in recent history). The Nuggets are now the last ABA merger team to win a NBA title.

I agree Jokic is clearly the best player in the playoffs. In fact, he's the best player the Nuggets have ever had (George Karl & Carmelo Anthony couldn't get it done in 9 tries considering Karl coached some of most talented teams the Nuggets ever had). And the Joker becomes the first player drafted outside the top 15 to win MVP honors in the finals.

Let's not forget Mike Malone who discoverd Jokic over there in Serbia & had to convince ownership to take a chance on him (Jokic, only a 2nd rd pick, was considered to be an unathletic big man who showed some potential but would need to be developed over the years). And good thing ownership heeded to Malone's recommendation & with his development of Jokic - the Nuggets have one of the greatest centers/big men in the history of the league.
 
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jmdirt

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And so it came to be...

There are a lot of athletic youngsters heading into the NBA!

I like the show on ABC because we all know that you don't get to the NBA without a support system.

In other big NBA news, Joran Poole made it clear that he can not play with Green. He will be the man in DC.
 
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movingtarget

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jmdirt said:
And so it came to be...

There are a lot of athletic youngsters heading into the NBA!

I like the show on ABC because we all know that you don't get to the NBA without a support system.

In other big NBA news, Joran Poole made it clear that he can not play with Green. He will be the man in DC.
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Yeah no surprise that Poole got moved. Wembanyama moves incredibly well for someone who is 7 4! Seems the Pelicans are thinking of moving Zion as well.
 
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King Boonen

King Boonen

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Smart's tenure in Boston is over. A devisive player among Celtics fans, seems you either love him or hate him, no middle ground. Assuming the plan is for White to take his role at the moment, though there's rumours they're trying to move Pritchard too, so maybe lining up for someone else.
 
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movingtarget

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King Boonen said:
Smart's tenure in Boston is over. A devisive player among Celtics fans, seems you either love him or hate him, no middle ground. Assuming the plan is for White to take his role at the moment, though there's rumours they're trying to move Pritchard too, so maybe lining up for someone else.
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It was supposed to be Brogdon to the Clippers but they were worried about his injury history and I think the Celtics got Porzingis ?
 
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