THE HOCKEY ASSIST

The Miami Herald on the Miami Heat sharing the puck, oops, I mean sharing the basketball and getting the hockey assist.

All the pundits who dislike LeBron James and shout that he should shoot the ball at the end of the game, this article is for you!

As a coach you want your players playing unselfish basketball. You want everyone sharing the ball, not hogging it. The defending champs are all about playing the right way.

“[James] could have had more [assists] if he was ego-driven, hunting for his own,’’ coach Erik Spoelstra said. “I think he had three to five hockey assists where he knew it would be a rotation where the next guy would be open. He’s looking at the play after the play after the play.’’

“We’re playing at a high level offensively and it’s because we have unselfish guys,’’ James said. “We don’t care who shoots, we don’t care who passes. We’re finding the open guy and everyone on the floor is making plays. That’s all that matters.’’

“We talked about hockey assists in high school,’’ James said. “I come from a very unselfish brand of basketball as I grew up. That’s how my little league coaches taught me up through high school. It’s just stuck with me.’’

“It was a big thing at Marquette to get a hockey assist,’’ Wade said. “Coach rewarded us for it more than regular assists. You would come in and say, ‘Ten hockey assists tonight,’ and there would be something on your locker. If you didn’t have any you would have a big doughnut on your locker.’’

HOOPS135@HOTMAIL.COM

TWITTER: @CoachFinamore

FRIDAY’S FREE-THROWS

Marc Spears of Yahoo Sports on the Knicks-Heat game last night. Miami came out on top 102-88.

Shandel Richardson of the Sun Sentinel on Miami Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra with a few words about Jeremy Lin.

“It’s terrific to be involved with changing people’s perceptions, but ultimately, hopefully a year from now the story will be about the basketball story and it won’t be about ethnicity.”

Jerry Rhead, a local youth baseball and basketball coach recently wrote about enthusiasm in a coach on the sidelines.

Congratulations to the LIU Blackbirds. Jimmy Ferry’s Flatbush avenue crew clinched the NEC regular season title. The marketing folks at LIU should have a promo with Junior’s restaurant, located right across the street. When LIU scores 80 points or more, with your ticket stub you can get a free slice of their fantastic cheesecake.

Do you know about Iowa Hawkeyes senior Matt Gatens? Well maybe you should do some research. The guy scored 33 last night against Wisconsin. Few nights before against IU he had 30. Iowa has won 4 of their last 6 games.

Quote of the Day: “We got a journey ahead,” -Tyson Chandler

Hoops135@hotmail.com

Follow me on Twitter: @CoachFinamore

STEP UP

“Never retreat. Never explain. Get it done and let them howl.”

-Benjamin Jowett

In case you didn’t know, or maybe you couldn’t figure it out, I am here  to tell you what is wrong with the Miami Heat.

It’s the Dallas Mavericks!

Nah, just kidding, that’s bad blog material, right? But it’s half-true.

I will tell you this, Rick Carlisle’s crew doesn’t get enough credit. Most of the talk is how poorly Miami is playing, mainly LeBron James.

Sometimes a game is won and not lost.

First thing I hear or read after a Miami loss is “LeBron this and LeBron that”. Anyone who knows the game realizes his lack of scoring in the 4th quarter is one of the many problems the Heat face, though it’s not the main problem.

Erik Spoelstra has bigger fish to fry.

For starters, their defense has been bad; especially last night during game 5 where the Mavericks won 112-103.

Dallas moves the ball better than anyone in the league.

They move the ball side to side faster and quicker than any team I have seen in a long time.

Miami’s rotations are slow. They don’t move on the pass, they are moving on the catch. They seem to always be late.

Their communication is poor and their body language is awful. There’s no one in a stance, there’s no one over-playing, no one pointing, I never see any hands up. Hands are inactive. They don’t subscribe to my theory on defense, “NEVER RELAX!”

I need to mention their defense in transition; it looks like a playground filled with middle school children during recess; wild and chaotic.

How many times are they going to allow JJ Barea to break them down? This guy looks like an all-star.

Give the Mavericks a ton of credit; they care about each other. I don’t care what your high school coach tells you, teammates need to care about each other. Have you ever heard that stupid theory, “Players don’t need to get along with each other off the court, just as long as they get along on the court.” What nonsense!

Dallas is willing to give the ball up and make the extra pass, hitting the open man. They are confident on offense where Miami seems rattled.

Miami holds the ball too long on offense. It seems like they are being called for more 24 second shot clock violations than ever.  They dribble, dribble, dribble, and boom, the shot clock is winding down, forcing a Miami player to jack up an ill-advised shot. There’s no movement. There’s no energy. They look stale. And how many times are they going to run that same set where the guard hits the high post and sprints to the strong side corner to screen his teammate?

Last but not least, Chris Bosh needs to step up. Sure he’s scored some points in this series but when is he going to stop someone late in the game? There was one play in particular on defense when Dirk Nowitzki caught a pass on the left baseline and Bosh went out to close out; Dirk swept the ball low and drove right past him for a dunk. That can’t happen. That’s not championship defense.  When is Bosh going to block a shot in crunch time? How about helping when one of your teammates gets beat off the dribble? Last night in the 4th quarter Bosh made a basket at the 10:02 mark to give Miami a 90-85 lead. The rest of his night went like this:

5:35 –  Defensive rebound

4:00 –  Turnover

3:38 –  1 of 2 from the free-throw line

:56 –  1 of 2 from the free-throw line

:13 –  missed 3 point shot

That’s not much production down the stretch from a player who is part of ‘The Big 3″.

The last 5 minutes of the 1st quarter last night was some of the best basketball I have seen in a long time; matter of fact I haven’t seen that kind of shooting since I watched Ziggy’s Brooklyn USA Team play Riverside at West 4th Street Park.  Both teams shot a combined 13-15 to finish out the quarter. Even Jeff Van Gundy  of ABC said last night that it was the best championship game he has ever seen.

I hope Spoelstra gets it together for game 6 Sunday night. I want to see a 7th game but if their defense does not improve and they don’t move the ball, they may be watching Dallas poppin’ bubbly in South Beach.

What’s up with ABC? How come they have not shown one mug shot of Mark Cuban during the game? We can’t get a live interview with Doris Burke and the owner of the Dallas Mavericks?

hoops135@hotmail.com

Follow me on Twitter: @CoachFinamore

2-3-2

“Right thinking paves the way to right behavior.”

-Andy Stanley

Game 1 of the NBA finals went to the Miami Heat last night 92-84. Game 2 is Thursday night.

It happens all the time with every sporting event. You have a winner and you have a loser.

What’s inevitable is the arm-chair coaches and all the second guessers, fantasy coaches and of course your bloggers/analysts who give you their predictions.

Then you have your guys who turn this into rocket science. It’s not.

Charles Barkley said, “Everybody thinks they’re a genius.”

Basketball is a simple game. The object is to get the ball in the basket. Too many people overanalyze it.

I have said for years that there are many ways to win; each coach has a different philosophy.

Last night the shooting wasn’t as good as we are used to seeing but the bottom line is Miami made more baskets.

Two areas where many people talked about leading up to the series was outside shooting and bench play. Everyone who gets paid to analyze basketball said Dallas shot it better from distance and they also had a better bench. Only problem is someone forgot to tell the Miami Heat.

Miami shot 11-24 from three-point range, Dallas 9-22.

Miami’s bench scored 27 points, the Mavericks 17.

“We gotta make more shots,” said Mavs head coach Rick Carlisle.

See, it’s simple.

Mavericks back-up point guard JJ Barea shot 1-8 from the field. Heat back-up guard Mario Chalmers was 3-7 from distance.

Mike Miller of the Heat, who everyone looked at as a great pick up by Miami in the off-season because of his outside shooting grabbed 5 rebounds last night in 20 minutes. He does other things besides score.

When Deshawn Stevenson made a 3 at the 8-minute mark of the 4th quarter to bring Dallas within 3, 72-69 the Mavs went almost 4 minutes without a point.

Hard to imagine half-time analysts for ABC could go the whole half without mentioning the play of Chris Bosh. The former Georgia Tech standout scored 13 points and 7 rebounds at the break.

Excellent coaching move by Erik Spoelstra late in the game; he had LeBron on Jason Terry and Udonis Haslem on Dirk Nowitzki.

The Heat snatched 16 offensive rebounds, Dallas had 6.

Everyone breaks down LeBron’s game and talks about what he can’t do; but I always stick to what Don Nelson once said about building up a player’s strength. Concentrate on your strengths.  They used to say that LBJ couldn’t shoot from the outside. Well he went 4-5 last night from distance. James also ran the pick and roll to perfection last night with Bosh. Not many guys can make a great bounce pass to a rolling teammate. I’m all for improvement but be realistic when looking to add something to your game.

Nowitzki tore a tendon in his middle finger of his off-hand. He said he will be ready Thursday night. Everyone is saying Dirk played well in the 4th quarter last night but they are forgetting to mention that in the final period he went from the 9:45 mark to the 3:00 mark without a point. Credit Miami’s defense…During that time Dirk took only 1 shot.

Once again, my theory on how the media/the Mothership has hurt youth basketball around America; NBA TV’s assist of the game last night on their post game show was an ally oop pass from D-Wade to James for a dunk. To me, it’s the gorgeous pick and roll with the bounce pass from James to Bosh for a lay-up. Fundamentals, let’s concentrate on the fundamentals. The kids are watching.

Why is it that in high school and college basketball when you are on the floor with the ball and you stand up, it’s a travel? But it’s not in the NBA?

hoops1135@hotmail.com

Follow me on Twitter: @CoachFinamore

LAST TEAM STANDING

“No one ever remembers who came in 2nd place.”

-John Madden

We are here, finally. The NBA championship starts tonight. Game 1 Miami Heat vs the Dallas Mavericks in Miami for all the marbles.

Many are billing this matchup as ‘LeBron vs Dirk’. But it’s actually a lot more than that. There are many fantastic players on both sides.

What started as a circus last June (The Decision) has now ended with a team that has found the formula in Miami. The Heat are learning the secret that Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird learned, but not by talking about it. Playing together and sacrificing for the good of the team. In case you didn’t know it, that’s how you win championships.

You need players who buy into the team concept. You don’t need selfish players who only care about themselves.

If I’m a reporter at the NBA Finals, I ask Mavericks head coach Rick Carlisle, “if you think Dirk Nowitzki is in top 10 of all-time, where would you rank LeBron James?” Speaking of reporters, did you know Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra’s grandfather used to be a sportswriter and covered the Detroit Tigers?

Everyone knows about the players who score all the points and the one who grabs the rebounds but do you pay attention to who is out on the court the longest? James plays 44.0 minutes per game in the 2010-11 playoffs. He’s tops in that category.

Someone on Twitter mentioned that LeBron has to add a cross-over, inside-out dribble and a jab step to his game. Yeah sure, how about adding a teacher’s certificate too, so he can teach 7th grade Math. Some people will always nit-pick. If anything, James should add a low-post game before he adds those dribbling moves.

With the NBA draft right around the corner, which is more difficult? Recruiting HS players for your college program or drafting players for your NBA team?

I had to laugh yesterday when I read someone write that the Penn State men’s head coaching position is a bad job. Do you know how many coaches would love that gig? If the A.D. at Penn State wants to hit a home run, they should hire Jim Boylen as their new coach.

You want an outstanding non-sports book to read? Pick up ‘Alphaville’ written by Michael Codella. He’s a  retired NYC cop who talks about his days working on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. You will not put it down, trust me.

hoops135@hotmail.com

Follow me on Twitter: @CoachFinamore