Rebounding Never Goes Out of Style, as Oklahoma City is Again Showing in the Finals

by gordie | Jun 16, 2025 | NBA

Forty-one years ago, then-Lakers coach Pat Riley – long before he became the legend he has since become – unveiled a simple mantra amid one of those knock-down, drag-out meetings with Boston in the NBA Finals: “No rebounds, no rings.” One year earlier, Moses Malone...

T.J. McConnell, Combative as Ever, Helps Bring the Pacers Ever Closer to a Title

by gordie | Jun 13, 2025 | NBA

Just imagine T.J. McConnell on the Western Pennsylvania playgrounds way back when. Imagine how a guy who looks like that and plays like that was regarded by his fellow competitors. Especially after he spent the day contesting every dribble, every shot, every inch of...

Pacers Produce Another Miracle, and Now, Maybe, They Can Eat Lightning and, Well, Ya Know …

by gordie | Jun 7, 2025 | NBA

Watching Tyrese Haliburton’s latest miracle – a wing jumper with less than a second left that lifted his Pacers over Oklahoma City in Game 1 of the NBA Finals – had me thinking about the original “Rocky,” and one scene in particular. Small exaggeration, but only a...

To Some, Having an NBA Team in Oklahoma City Will Never Look Right (and I Can Relate)

by gordie | Jun 4, 2025 | NBA

The 1983-84 NBA season was the last of eight Wally Walker played in the NBA, and with he and the Houston Rockets visiting Philadelphia just past that season’s midpoint my mission was to write the obligatory local-boy-still-doing-us-proud piece about the Penn Manor...

Enigmatic Tyrese Haliburton Holds Key to Indiana’s Fortunes in Series vs. the Knicks

by gordie | May 31, 2025 | NBA

The “overrated” designation attached to Indiana Pacers point guard Tyrese Haliburton never felt quite right. Not when The Athletic designated him as such in an anonymous poll of his peers (a few of them, anyway) on the eve of the NBA playoffs, and not as he has led...

Tom Thibodeau Alters His Approach, Alters Game 3 of the New York-Indiana Series

by gordie | May 26, 2025 | NBA

One of the defining moments of Tom Thibodeau’s coaching career came on April 28, 2012. He was in his second year as an NBA head man at that point, overseeing the Chicago Bulls, the Eastern Conference’s top seed, in their playoff opener against the Sixers. And in an...

Fifty-Six Years After the Fact, Tyrese Haliburton Matches Don Nelson’s Miraculous Shot

by gordie | May 22, 2025 | NBA

You wouldn’t normally mention Tyrese Haliburton and Don Nelson in the same sentence. Haliburton, the willowy Indiana Pacers guard, was recently derided by his peers as the most overrated player in the NBA (a designation that now seems silly, given the way he has...

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander Continues to Play in a Crowd … And Stand Out From It

by gordie | May 21, 2025 | NBA

The idea when defending Oklahoma City midrange maestro Shai Gilgeous-Alexander – a guy who inflicts most of his damage off the dribble, from 15 feet in – is to make him play in a crowd. And that is the exact phraseology opposing coaches use, in strategy sessions with...

Who is the Quintessential 76er? How ‘Bout Willie Burton, Author of the Most Unlikely 50-Point Game in NBA History?

by gordie | May 18, 2025 | NBA

With the Knicks advancing to the Eastern Conference Finals for the first time since 2000 courtesy of Friday’s rout of the Celtics in Game 6 of the teams’ semifinal series, there was a reminder of another bit of Sixers ignominy, in a season rife with it. Absent from...

Opportunity Has Come Knocking in the NBA Playoffs, and Luke Kornet (!) has Answered, Among Others

by gordie | May 16, 2025 | NBA

Boston Celtics star Jayson Tatum shreds an Achilles tendon in one of the most harrowing scenes imaginable, ending his season and putting his team on the brink. So who comes to Boston’s rescue, one game later? Why, Luke Kornet, of course. The “Green Kornet,” as he is...