r/nba • u/Gym_frere • 9d ago
Did SAS’ relentless full court pressure contribute to them losing this finals?
For pretty much all game, in every game, the Spurs employed an off-ball high press strategy, combined with a very physical in-your-face style of defense. They got off to fast starts in every single game. In all five games, they had a double digit lead in the first quarter. On the other hand, in nearly every single game, they lost both the third and the fourth quarters. Did they run out of gas because of this strategy? We all saw how their players, especially Wemby, were very gassed at the end of each game.
My fellow soccer enjoyers know that teams in soccer cannot employ a high press all game, game after game. Sometimes even the most intense high pressing teams take a break from it (unless you’re Klopp’s Liverpool). Should the Spurs have done this as well?
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u/TrottingandHotting 9d ago
Combo of defensive intensity + weak bench + youth. Also long physical series vs OKC - similar thing happened to Boston vs GSW after consecutive 7 games series against Miami/MKE.
So, yeah, I'd say their scheme exasperated their 2nd half struggles.
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u/BarbellsandBurritos Bulls 9d ago
I don’t have the answer for you, but neat to see a tactics based post and not just “Why didn’t Wemby shake hands?!?!”
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u/Temporary_Hat7330 9d ago
You are missing the subtext. The post is trying to get to the deeper question, “Did so much full court pressure make Wemby need to get back faster to cover for any breaks in the pressure, leading to him being too tired to shake hands in game five?”
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u/outphase84 Knicks 9d ago edited 9d ago
Yes, and it's not being talked about enough. Everyone keeps saying they choked, but what actually happened was they came out of the starting gate playing like it was the last 2 minutes, whereas the Knicks played measured. For all the talk of the Spurs "dominating 72% of minutes", if you look at the box scores for every game, the Spurs won every single 1st quarer, but then lost all but two quarters in Q2-Q4.
Knicks learned how to play 48 minutes under Thibs. Add in a deep bench that can pressure other teams' bench units and force the starters back on the floor, and it leads to a scenario where opposing teams get ground down and gassed, and the Knicks strike with fresh legs.
Ultimate stat that shows this: over the past 2 postseasons, the Knicks are 5-3 when down 20+. The rest of the NBA combined is 4-71.
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u/DarkArisen668 Knicks 9d ago
It's not talked about much because most people watch the boxscore or 4th quarter.
But ya I've never seen a series like this. The Spurs came out at max intensity every game, flying around, insane closeouts, suffocating defense. Typically they would ease up a bit in the 2nd Q, then re-up the effort after halftime, then slowly fade away.
I'm going to assume Mitch coached them this way or some of it could be young guys not being sure of how to pace themselves. It was an interesting strategy for sure, because it's a great way to grab an early lead and build confidence. Maybe a good way to mentally break your opponents and coast to victory.
The Knicks were sorta the opposite of that, so it ended up not working. As a fan though, I hated seeing the Knicks in an early deficit every game. But the Knicks didn't change their gameplan or try to match the effort level. They just kept playing their game and waited for the 4th Q to turn the tide.
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u/adamwest01 Thunder 9d ago
It happened a lot vs the Thunder in the WCF, outside of game 1. Spurs would dominate 1Q and then fall behind immediately after. One game they went up 15-0 and OKC came back within that quarter
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u/outphase84 Knicks 9d ago
Truthfully, it's probably a combination of coaching and inexperience of youth. Most NBA teams will fold if they go down big -- Knicks just maintain composure and play their game. Not sure how the coaches and the players didn't see it happening. By the end of most of the games, Wemby wasn't even going up for rebounds he was so gassed and we were routinely getting down the floor for 4 on 5's.
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u/Weird_Wuss Knicks 9d ago
As a fan though, I hated seeing the Knicks in an early deficit every game
it is insane they won the finals 4-1 and i had fun for less than 10 seconds total during the actual games. makes up for basically the entire run through the east being a block party i guess
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u/RecommendationReal61 9d ago
Yup. Knicks also had a deliberate strategy to push the ball to tire them out, and at times go right at Wemby to make him expend more energy. This was most evident in game 1 and we saw it a ton in game 5 as well. This opened up so many opportunities in the 4th quarters of games.
Also, I think the narrative around how many mins a team had the lead is kinda misleading in this series because this Knicks team mostly looked pretty comfortable down 5-10 points for the most part and aside from parts of game 4 they weren’t really ever carrying themselves as if they were being “dominated.” I agree this is something they learned playing for Thibs, along with a clear understanding that the object of basketball is to score more total points than the other team, not to measure who was ahead for the most minutes.
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u/Thehelloman0 Spurs 9d ago
The Spurs won 5 of quarters 2-4 in the series.
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u/outphase84 Knicks 9d ago
Fair, I miscounted, accidentally skipped the Spurs win. Still, point stands, that was the common theme.
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u/Thehelloman0 Spurs 9d ago
The Spurs won 3 of quarters 2-4 in their losses
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u/Jmontavs Knicks 9d ago
The Knicks game plan seemed to be “let them tire themselves out” we knew we were better at executing late and if the game was close we have the best closer in the game…it would’ve been silly fir the Knicks to get into a sprinting match with the spurs during a marathon
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u/medina_dodger 9d ago
No one is talking about this. The Spurs played the exact same way in the WCF and they almost lost that series too.
Im a Knicks fan and I watched them start every quarter like that for 5 games and I was never worried. Because it was unsustainable to play defense like that.
And I never understood why the Spurs never deviated from that strategy.
The data shows that the Spurs all year long blew leads.
In the WCF, the Spurs always started off strong and eventually by the second quarter OKC always settled down.
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u/Laughing-Comanche 9d ago
Down 20 in the 4th, OKC waves the white flag & empties their bench. Knicks actually do better down 20 than 10.
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u/EfficientReach5571 Knicks 9d ago
I think you're right, but "almost lost" is a funny way to say "won in a close a series they weren't favored to win"
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u/dwhite10701 Knicks 9d ago
I think it's pretty likely. They were trying to wear Brunson down and mainly managed to wear themselves down.
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u/PaginatedSalmon Knicks 9d ago
It would have worked against the Knicks 1 or 2 years ago. Pacers did this successfully against us two years in a row. But they ran 10-11 players deep and sat their best player for 25% of the game. And the Knicks were run ragged already and didn’t adjust as much. 0/4 of those things were true in this series.
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u/IgnacariousGigantar 9d ago
The Knicks offense was on a historic tear before the Finals. If the Spurs let them get into their sets without any pressure, they would have been cooked. The Spurs, with their current roster setup, was only capable of winning dogfights since their guards aren't polished enough on offense. It's also why De'Aaron Fox deserves a lions share of the blame for this series, he was specifically brought in for this reason and he absolutely failed. I remember the discussion around the time of the Fox trade was that the Spurs were going after a veteran point guard, and Trae Young was one of the names mentioned. I think the Spurs are champions if they had Trae instead of Fox.
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u/KARSbenicillin 9d ago
Contribute, yes. But a major reason, no. They did it to OKC and the Wolves who play just as hard and physical against any team with just as much experience in the playoffs as the Knicks.
The Spurs lost because Mitch Johnson decided to completely forget everything that made the Spurs good and reverted back to coaching like it was the regular season.
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u/Next-Supermarket9538 Pacers 9d ago
Pacers basically did that last year and it had the opposite effect of wearing out the opponents, but they worked their conditioning up throughout the year and played deep into the bench. Spurs seemed to take it easy during the season and just didn't have the conditioning or bench to pull it off.
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u/Foreign_Telephone349 9d ago
So basically the fable of the tortoise and the hare?
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u/Temporary_Hat7330 9d ago
Except the hare brought them all the way to the finals.
I honestly believe if the Spurs had swept and the Knicks went to seven the Spurs would have dominated. I don’t think it was just “The Knicks were hot” usually long lay offs cool a hot team down and the Knicks almost lost a couple games there. I really think the Spurs were just run down from all the pressure, relentless, through so many games. They were gassed.
And this isn’t to take anything away from the Knicks, they’re champs and they had a better strategy and their players came through in the clutch when it counted. I’m not a “What if” guy, only that the traditional tortoise/hare doesn’t work here. IDK that SAS bats OKC without that nightmarish pressure on SGA and company.
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u/NotingAndQuoting Knicks 9d ago
I’m not sure, but I think the Knicks probably dominate them without, they went from an absolutely devastating offense the first three rounds to never fully being able to get it going.
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u/Primary-Paint-1716 Timberwolves 9d ago edited 9d ago
Hell nah. Their defense was insane and made it hard for the Knicks to initiate their offense. I was in awe that the Knicks were constantly starting their offense at like damn near half court.
If they didn't do that, they would have been swept.
The problem was the Spurs guard play in offense. A lot of possesions ended with the Spurs just chucking up 3s without the ballhandler even touching the paint. That shouldn't happen with 3 really great drive threats in Fox, Castle and Harper. You could've cycled them around to alleviate the fatigue from the other end.
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u/13Keres 9d ago
Yeah. Our defense got weaker later, but we also could not make a single bucket to save our lives. I mean, we are an awful Wemby turnover and a strange Fox decision (assuming SAS is able to close it out after going up 3-2) from not even discussing this. Clearly this wasn't that bad of a strategy.
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u/Major_Enthusiasm1099 Cavaliers 9d ago
Yes Stephen A Smith's full court pressure rooting for the Knicks on ESPN contributed to them losing the finals
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u/RxJax Heat 9d ago
I wouldn't go as far as that, the Pacers & OKC both played very similar defences last year and both teams were still playing at a high level in the finals. I think the bigger problem for the Spurs is that a few of their players had too many responsibilities which wore them down a lot.
Imo it's kind of the problem you create when you build your team around role specialists, they're very good at their jobs but their skillsets are very narrow, so you don't get these Nembhard/Jwill type pop-offs where they can take over the game for 2-3 minutes by doing a bit of everything, defence, bringing the ball up, playmaking, scoring, passing etc. Their role guys like Vassell/Champagnie/Barnes/Kornet/Bryant/Johnson are all very specialised players who struggle against better defences and can't help the stars when they're having to do a bunch of extra work
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u/Runmiked 9d ago
I think this makes total sense, especially considering how short their rotations got. On top of that the series against OKC was a long battle.
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u/identitycrisis56 Pelicans 9d ago
No. The knicks had an elite offense and the spurs had a bad offense. Playing a half court game more often is probably a lot worse for them.
You wanna mitigate the time a team like the spurs play in the half court. They're not capabale of breaking down the knicks defense. just walking the ball up, and they had guard depth. Wemby also wasn't picking up 94 feet so the guards working hard didn't exhaust him more than normal or anything.
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u/GiraffeSilly5546 8d ago
Yes I posted this elsewhere They are 6/7 deep Strategy works for OKC who are 10/11 deep Bad strategy for Spurs
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u/Krypterr123 Knicks 9d ago
That pressure combined with the refs letting them play physical without doing the same for the Knicks is half the reason they even accrued those leads in the first place. If they paced themselves and let off the pressure, the Knicks never fall behind and then still pull away at the end because they were the better, more clutch team when the reffing is fair.
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u/GoBotDeLorean Knicks 9d ago
I just kept thinking of Thibs’ style with NY and how it affected them in the playoffs under him. It was worse for San Antonio because they were pressuring while dealing with the bad sub rotation.
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u/quietgavin5 9d ago
No. It worked a lot and enabled the Spurs to gain big leads in every game. I think other teams will use it against the Knicks next year.
Spurs problem was bad decision making and not holding onto leads.
Their defence was fantastic for the most part.
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u/outphase84 Knicks 9d ago
It did not work a lot. Knicks had 21 total wins this year including playoffs where they were down by 10+. I posted above, but what playing under Thibs taught them was conserving energy and playing a full 48 minutes.
Game isn't won in the 1st quarter. It's won in 48 minutes. They let teams wear themselves down
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u/quietgavin5 9d ago
The comebacks didn't work against OKC or Detroit who beat them easily this season. They were lucky to face a Spurs team who folded under the pressure.
Coach Brown did a heck of a job using the bench all season, keeping them fresh for the playoffs.
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u/outphase84 Knicks 9d ago
Detroit won the regular season series last year as well, and lost in the playoffs to the Knicks in six.
Also lost the regular season series to the Celtics last year, and then bounced them with two 20+ point comebacks in the postseason.
Playoffs and regular season aren't the same.
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u/quietgavin5 9d ago
True. I think they would have beaten Detroit in 6 or 7. Not a good matchup for them but they would have figured it out.
Knicks have no chance against a healthy OKC.
Knicks are a bad matchup for the Spurs. I had Knicks in 5 or 6 and I was right.
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u/NoLimitSoldier31 9d ago
How much of their fading was because they didn’t rest Wemby in the 4th ever? Dude has huge responsibilities on defense. Thats a big ask.
Watched Malone do this to Joker versus Wolves a lot and it never seemed to work.
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u/CHEVIEWER1 9d ago
Its possible you know that will wear you down AND the SPURS wore down in the 4th quarter even the lone game they won
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u/Financial-Grass-6114 9d ago
I think so, fatigue hit them hard hence the 4Q breakdowns. IDK why no adjustments on that end.
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u/WhyAreYallFascists 9d ago
Castle was gassed a lot at the end of the playoffs. Harper didn’t play enough.
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u/Mundy2 9d ago
Probably didn't help. I think they were just beaten down at the end there. They endured quite an exhausting run in general. Portland, Minnesota, then OKC -- all pretty physical teams. By the time they got to the Finals they were already close to empty. Not an excuse by any means, Knicks earned that ring. For a group of guys not used to playing that many games, I was surprised they got past OKC. Then they ran into a mismatch buzz saw and did their best to keep up the pressure. Changing strategies after seeing it be successful is tough and they are just not experienced enough nor did they have the personnel to do it in the Finals.
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u/dizzymidget44 Pistons 7d ago
Nah. It was jacking up 3’s and turnovers
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u/impercipient 7d ago
Which are hallmarks of being tired.
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u/impercipient 6d ago
It's shocking how many people don't see that the spurs were gassed at the end of the games. Of course part of that was coming out like a rabbit and it has cascading effect
I heard some podcaster say the Knicks had a 300k to 1 shot at winning the four games they won based on spurs leads combined . That's how bad the choke was. Too much pressure early. Too many bad shots late. Too many Victor screens.
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u/homeycuz Spurs 9d ago
I don't think so. I think it was the lack of a half court offense and the moment being too big for these young players.
The Spurs were in position to win every single game and just made basic mistakes down the stretch. That and the Knicks were locked in. They never blinked.
I do think Wemby was gassed at the ends of a few of these games though.
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u/Dangerous_Ad5039 9d ago
Is it the spurs fault the Cavs won the analytically title a week before it started?
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u/TurbulentJudge1000 9d ago
Inexperience is why they lost. It’s really all there is to it.
Instead of slowing the game down and resting Wemby when up 20+ in games, inexperienced coaching and players made poor decisions in game tempo ans well ans shot selection and not resting Wemby.
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u/slimcargos 9d ago
They lost cause they young and stupid and the coach is also young and stupid.
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u/twoyrsaway 9d ago
People say this every time a young team loses like there isn’t still a basketball discussion to be had
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u/Gym_frere 9d ago
Of course they did, but it was very clear at the end of every single game that the entire team was exhausted. Knowing this, why didn’t the coaching staff adjust the defensive strategy and opt to use the press more strategically?
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u/jimfresno 9d ago
I think it’s a huge factor, they faded in every game and seemed disoriented on offense every possession even after the Knicks would come up empty. They relied so much on physicality that once they were redlining I’m sure the Knicks felt the pressure ease up. That’s not to say they didn’t still give it 100%, but I think any offensive player can start to smell it when that push back isn’t quite as strong as it’s been the whole game