Game 3 in the books and as the Heat blew out the Spurs in game 2, the Spurs returned the favor in game 3 raining twice as much 3's as the Heat did in game 2. As usual I'll start with the losing team, some of the positives and the negatives, followed by another paragraph on the winning team.
The Miami Heat, how did they get caught up on the other side of the stick? The guys, with the exception of Mike Miller, who helped blow the gate open in game 2, all of a sudden got cold. To be honest, Mike Miller is the only positive for the Heat this game, scoring 15 points off the bench, perfect from beyond the arc 5-5. I thought his game in the first half kept the Heat hanging around for the most part and he's been playing better in the finals than the whole playoffs where obviously Shane Battier got the nod, but Battier's has been shut out for the finals and they activate a great sharpshooter like Miller. Negatives, the whole team. You know it's awful when Chris Bosh is your top performer and he had a bad shooting night with 12 points, 10 rebounds, but on 4-10 shooting. What happen Chalmers? What happen Ray Ray? What happen Birdman? Took the night off this whole game. In fact besides Chalmers, Haslem is another starter that finished with a big doughnut in the points category. LeBron James, admit it Heat fans, LeBron fans, James has been terrible the last three finals games and this guy is supposed to be the best player in the game today. 15 points, 11 rebounds on 7-21 shooting from James, even Kobe is face palming from that horrid performance in the finals. If the Heat want to have a chance, LeBron needs to have a 20+ point performance while retaining his usual triple-double stats, but this guy seems like he's afraid of doing that. I don't understand, you win Finals MVP honors last year, but you're stinking it up in the last 3 games of this years' NBA Finals. Give me a break.
Onto the San Antonio Spurs, the color in this game ain't teal green, but it's Neal Green this game. Gary Neal and Danny Green big positives this game for the Spurs. These two are not afraid of the moment in this finals. You talk about guy a who was a 2nd round pick and a guy who was an undrafted free agent, didn't get fair shots from teams, manage to find their confidence playing for the Spurs because Pop is a good as f*ck coach, it's hard to believe they're playing at such a high level on the NBA's grandest stage. Danny Green 27 points, 7-9 shooting from behind the arc, Gary Neal off the bench, scoring 24 points on 6-10 shooting from behind the arc, including a 3 at the buzzer to give the Spurs a 44-50 edge at halftime. If they keep showing up like this, the Spurs are gonna take it if either Neal or Green keep performing like this on a consistent basis throughout this finals. Kawhi Leonard, finally a great all-around game from him this finals scoring 14 points, 12 rebounds on 6-10 shooting including 2-3 from behind the arc. I'll give credit, he has been pestering LeBron this finals, the kid has been holding off on his own against "the best player in the game today" according to the media. Probably the negative from the Spurs is Tony Parker, as I went back to the game, I heard about he went to the locker on a hamstring issue. For now it's a non-issue, but if it is, it's a devastating blow to the Spurs as Parker is the biggest key to Spurs' victory in my preview.
Finals game 4 what can we expect? Game 1 was close game, down to the wire, games 2 and 3 were blowouts, what next a shootout? We'll see what game 4 can bring to the table.
Next Game: NBA Finals Game 4 @ SA (06/13/13)
No comments:
Post a Comment