I watch the first game of each playoff series with special interest, because the game one winners prevail in an NBA playoff series with the seven game format nearly 80% of the time. Unless the game one winner is a huge underdog that won because of a fluke or the game one winner is later debilitated by injuries, the matchup advantages that are decisive early tend to be decisive the rest of the way.
Here are thoughts and observations about each game from the first quadrupleheader of the 2021 NBA playoffs.
Milwaukee 109, Miami 107 (OT)
It might seem odd to suggest that the pressure is on the third seeded team in a matchup with the sixth seeded team, but the Heat defeated the Bucks 4-1 in the second round of the 2020 playoffs, winning the first three games before losing game four in overtime and then closing out the series by nine points in game five. Therefore, the Bucks needed to set the tone that this series will be different.
This game followed a rocky and winding road for the Bucks--who dominated the boards 64-51 but gave up 20 made three pointers while shooting just 5-31 from three point range--but Khris Middleton's dagger jumper at the end of overtime lifted them to victory. The Bucks no longer rely on having Giannis Antetokounmpo attack the "wall" set up by opposing defenses; they now can go to Middleton (27 points, six rebounds, six assists) or Jrue Holiday (20 points, 11 rebounds, three assists) with Antetokounmpo stationed on the baseline or in the paint forcing the defense to prevent him from catching lobs or grabbing offensive rebounds.
Make no mistake, though, Antetokounmpo is the best player on the court (26 points, 18 rebounds, five assists, three steals), though his shaky free throw shooting (6-13) almost proved fatal for the Bucks in game one.
This was a defensive struggle in which the Bucks shot poorly from the field (.438) and the Heat shot even worse (.364). Antetokounmpo shot 10-27 from the field, but the Heat's Jimmy Butler had the worst shooting game of his playoff career (4-22), though he did hit a key bucket to force overtime.
Dallas 113, L.A. Clippers 103
During last year's playoffs, the Clippers dispatched the Mavericks 4-2 and took a 3-1 lead versus the Nuggets before imploding with three straight "come from ahead" losses, but this time the implosion came in the first game of the first round: the Clippers led by as many as 12 points, but the Mavericks closed the game with an 18-5 run.
Luka Doncic did everything all over the court, finishing with a game-high 31 points on 11-24 field goal shooting while also grabbing 10 rebounds and passing for a game-high 10 assists. Doncic has three triple doubles in his seven career playoff games, with all seven games played versus the Clippers. If he is the best player on the court every game then this will be an unexpectedly short playoff run for the Clippers.
Kawhi Leonard led the Clippers with 26 points, but he shot just 9-22 from the field. He tied Doncic with a game-high 10 rebounds and he tied Paul George with a team-high five assists. George scored 23 points on 8-18 field goal shooting.
Despite all of his "load managing," it seems like Leonard is not 100% physically. That is not an excuse, but just a statement of fact. The Clippers have players with reputations as tough guys, but collectively the team seems a bit soft both mentally and physically; they manipulated the end of the season to avoid the Lakers and to get the Mavericks in the first round, and in my playoff preview I criticized the tanking and cautioned that the Clippers should be careful what they wish for, though I did still pick them to win this series.
The grass is not always greener on the other side. I can understand why Leonard left the Spurs if he felt like the organization mishandled his injury and then slandered him in the media, but he won a championship in Toronto with a close knit, mentally tough team. Why leave? So many players are chasing what they think/hope will be the next super team. Bring back the 1980s, when the same star players on the same teams battled each other year after year in the Conference Finals and the NBA Finals: the Philadelphia-Boston, Philadelphia-L.A., and Boston-L.A. rivalries were better than anything we see in the NBA today, and the Philadelphia-Milwaukee rivalry was very good as well, even though Milwaukee never made it to the NBA Finals during that era. Then Isiah Thomas led the Detroit Pistons from the cellar to the penthouse, kicking in the door to the exclusive three team club of NBA champions in the 1980s.
If the Clippers fall short and Leonard jumps to yet another team I will lose some respect for him. He chose to make his bed in L.A., and now he needs to figure out how to get the most of this talented team. As Michael Jordan advised Kobe Bryant, the best player has to work with what he has, not complain about what he does not have.
Brooklyn 104, Boston 93
The Nets, a super team put together to challenge the LeBron James-Anthony Davis Lakers, took a page out of James' book and spent the first half in "chill mode," trailing 53-47 at halftime. The "Big Three" shot 0-11 from three point range in the first half, but then led the Nets to an 18-4 run to start the second half. Kevin Durant led both teams in scoring (32 points) and rebounds (12). He did not shoot very well overall (10-25), but when the chips were down the Celtics had no answers. Kyrie Irving scored 29 points on 11-20 field goal shooting, while James Harden added 21 points on 5-13 field goal shooting. Harden contributed nine rebounds and a game-high eight assists. Harden is well-suited to being the third option on a contender, and it bodes well for the Nets that he understands his role as opposed to doing the "dribble, dribble, dribble"/jack up shots routine that failed to deliver a single NBA Finals appearance during his eight full seasons in Houston.
The Nets are not known for playing strong defense, but these Celtics--in marked contrast to the squads that advanced to the Eastern Conference Finals three times in the past four seasons--are not known for consistent effort; the Celtics shot just .369 from the field, with Jayson Tatum (6-22 field goal shooting) and Kemba Walker (5-16 field goal shooting) leading the bricklaying parade.
The Nets are talented enough to sweep this series, but it will be interesting to see if they can sustain that kind of focus. Is it important to the Celtics to compete, or do their players just want this dysfunctional and disjointed season to end? Game two will help to reveal the answers.
Portland 123, Denver 109
There are no secrets in this series: Denver has most of the size, while Portland has small guards who are deadly three point shooters. The Trail Blazers shot 19-40 from three point range in this game, while the Nuggets did not dominate enough in the paint to compensate for all of that long range bombing. Damian Lillard led both teams in scoring (34 points) and assists (13). He did not shoot that well overall (10-25) but he connected on 5-12 from three point range plus 9-9 on free throws. C.J. McCollum added 21 points, and Carmelo Anthony chipped in 18 points off of the bench.
Nikola Jokic tied Lillard with 34 points, and Jokic also had a game-high 16 rebounds, but the skillful passer only had one assist. Michael Porter Jr. scored 25 points, but the Trail Blazers created mismatches to exploit his perimeter defense; either he must do better, or the Nuggets must tweak their defense to provide more help.
The Nuggets tend to fall behind in games and in series before mounting comebacks, and teams led by small streak-shooting guards tend to not win too many playoff series, so of Saturday's four game one winners Portland is the least likely to win the series--but the Nuggets would be well advised to not trail 2-0 heading to Portland for two games.
Anthony's emergence as a somewhat effective sixth man (13.4 ppg on .421 field goal shooting while starting just three of 69 games during the regular season) has inspired many commentators to wax poetic about what a supposed injustice it was that Anthony was out of the league for over a year. Let's set the record straight: Anthony will be inducted in the Basketball Hall of Fame primarily because of his scoring (and also for leading Syracuse to the 2003 NCAA title), but he is no longer capable of consistently being a big-time scorer, and the other areas of the game that were never strong suits have not improved. Therefore, he is best suited to coming off of the bench--and when that idea was first proposed to him, he laughed out loud, much like Lamar Odom said that Phil Jackson "must have bumped his head" when Jackson determined that Odom should be the Lakers' sixth man. Unlike Anthony, though, Odom soon embraced his new role. When Anthony refused to accept his role and/or be effective/comfortable in that role, he ended up out of the league; when Anthony decided to accept that role and be reasonably productive (albeit not very efficient) in that role, Portland signed him.
In the last four games that Anthony played in before the playoffs (he was inactive for two games during this run), he scored three points (1-3 field goal shooting), 18 points (7-13 field goal shooting), five points (1-7 field goal shooting), and 10 points (3-10 field goal shooting). That works out to 9.0 ppg on .364 field goal shooting--and before anyone calls this "cherry picking," those numbers are not that much worse than his season averages, and if you scan through his 2020-21 game log you see 25 games in which he shot less than .400 from the field--that is more than one out of three of his total games played. Anthony shot .300 or less from the field in 18 games. Maybe if he was still a primary offensive threat who was drawing double teams to open up the floor we might be able to cut him some slack for all of that bricklaying, but he is the team's fifth leading scorer--and he is not making much of a contribution in rebounding (11th on the team in rebounds per minute), assists (eighth on the team in assists per minute) or defense.
Do the commentators who say things like "Carmelo Anthony is a walking bucket" realize how uninformed they sound every time they open their mouths? Carmelo Anthony is an aging former All-Star who is still capable of scoring double figures, albeit not very efficiently.
There is no doubt that Anthony enjoyed scoring 18 points versus his former team in game one. How many 18 point games will he have in this series? He matched or exceeded that total in 19 out of 69 games this season, so if this series goes seven games he might have one more 18 point game, but there is a decent chance that this turns out to be his highest scoring and best shooting game in the series.
That is not "hate"; that is just looking at his production, and projecting what is most likely to happen. If Anthony can exceed his established production rate, good for him.
That's the article: Bucks, Mavericks, Nets, and Trail Blazers Win As NBA Playoffs Begin
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