Game plan vs. Kawhi: “Attack him,” says Melton
[videos/interviews/transcripts]
Good to hear De’Anthony Melton talk about the game plan process, as well as Steve Kerr saying Draymond Green is excited, plus Kristaps Porzingis mention that he didn’t want to give away too many of the details while acknowledging Kawhi Leonard is liable to pull up from deep, which is an added wrinkle to his game that the Clippers’ superstar has added this year.
The gathering of the scrum with beat writers midday on the road, it sure feels like the NBA Playoffs, if not for a day or two or three, although it’s just a one-game playoff because, well, it’s the Play-in “Tournament”.
Going into Wednesday’s matchup, my most intriguing thoughts included:
Would the rotation be squeezed à la 2021 to just eight players? UPDATE: Danny Emerman of the SF Standard tweeted on Tuesday that Kerr said in today’s practice he could go 10-11 deep. This sounds plausible considering some of the old guys are on a minutes restriction roughly classified by Steve as “we’re not playing him 40 minutes”.
How will the actions look, especially as we even saw a double-big pick set for one Wardell Stephen Curry by both Porzingis and Al Horford in the meaningless 82nd regular season game the other night, see timestamps:
And will the defense play better? Will the Clippers not be as fast (i.e., John Collins not have multiple fast break dunks) with Kawhi the focal point, which would be a silver lining to our old guys? Looks like Dray will guard Kawhi, obviously, but Melton said the best way to wear him down is to “attack him,” perhaps suggesting that they either expect Leonard to guard Melt or the offense will target Kawhi. We shall see.
Transcripts from Monday’s practice are below the paywall:
