Details: When: Thursday, November 22nd Where: KeyArena Time (Seattle): 7:00 PM TV: FSN, League Pass Projected Starters: <font color="Green">Seattle (5-5)</font> Luke Ridnour Ray Allen Rashard Lewis Nick Collison Johan Petro <font color="Navy"> </font> <font color="Navy">Utah (5-7)</font> Deron Williams Gordon Giricek Matt Harpring Mehmet Okur Greg Ostertag Injury Troubles: <font color="Green">Seattle</font> Rick Brunson - Plantar fasciitis (probable) Flip Murray - Back spasms (probable) Johan Petro - Gas (probable) <font color="Navy"> </font> <font color="RoyalBlue"><font color="Navy">Utah</font> </font>Keith McLeod Carlos Boozer Andrei Kirilenko all out <div align="center">Brief Notes:</div> * The Sonics are streaking and face the under .500 division rival Jazz tonight. The Jazz are without their top two weapons in Kirilenko and Boozer so a Sonics win should be slightly more probable. * Flip Murray and Johan Petro are both expected to join the lineup again tonight after sitting out with injuries. Random Family Guy Quote: Chris: Doctor, I need you to get rid of this zit! Doug (Chris's Zit): You traitor! Doctor: Whoa, that's a doosie! I bet some of those awful kids at school call you Zit Face? Chris: No Doctor: Papa Zit? Chris: No Doctor: Pus Peak? Chris: No Doctor: Fat ass? Chris: Well..yeah.. Doctor: TSk, tsk..oh, that's terrible! All predictions, analysis and discussion relating directly to the game, both before, during and after, to be posted in this thread.
Seattle should win this one, especially when they are missing AK-47..Cant wait for the game, Im excited.
Boozer and AK-47 formed a strong defensive front line with good rebounding and offense to boot. Okur has never been mistaken for an offensive force, but despite his obvious faults Jerry Sloan brought Tag back for a reason. He brings shot blocking and rebounds back to the 5 spot for the Jazz. Luke and Nick will get swatted back if they try to offer up weak shots in the lane (they are the two most likely to do so). All that said, Lewis tends to get hot against the Jazz without Kirilenko, and they don't have any stellar offensive or defensive studs to cause problems if the Sonics execute their game. Luke will likely get bullied around by the rookie, but a few hard screens from Danny and Vitaly may encourage him to back off.
Almost half time and we are down by 10+. Do you guys think we'll bounce back and end up winning by +10?..Hopefully we do ahah.
We did it against Chicago, and they are a better team than Utah. I'm assuming that Okur will cool off, which sucks because he is on my fantasy team. I'd rather have the Supes get the W though. Pick up the slack Ray.
This game was a lackluster game that didnt show any emotion until Reggie Evans got into the game. Absolutely 0 production out of our trio of centers. Petro was the best id say simply because I dont think he hurt us like the other 2 and im confident he could hit an open layup (ohh Vitaly). I expect to see Moore or Swift on the active roster next game. I dunno if Weiss let up on them after our 3rd straight win or what but we looked like the team playing our 4th game in 5 nights.
Why wasnt petro playing more? he only played 10 minutes. I dont understand. He wasnt in foul trouble either. atleast he gives us that presence, people arent really intimidated by vitaly...
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting monty001:</div><div class="quote_post">Why wasnt petro playing more? he only played 10 minutes. I dont understand. He wasnt in foul trouble either. atleast he gives us that presence, people arent really intimidated by vitaly...</div> Weiss was looking desperately for a big man to do something and really petro was pretty ineffective when he played. Evans was the only big besides collison that was productive.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Coolguy777:</div><div class="quote_post">Weiss was looking desperately for a big man to do something and really petro was pretty ineffective when he played. Evans was the only big besides collison that was productive.</div> Your right about that - just a poor showing by our C's. Vitaly was especially terrible. Just a step slow to every spot the entire time he was in the game it seemed - its no suprise he had the lowest +/- on the team for the game at -7. Nick doesn't deserve alot of praise for this performance either I don't think, he was alright - nothing special. Reggie was the energetic boost we needed at the end - along with Lewis just taking over for us on the offensive side. The problem though is it takes this kind of game (when all the other bigs just don't have it) to put Reggie in at the end of a close game. For all he did right, he was 1-4 at the line over about the last 7 minutes. I know he got the offensive board after missing 2 in a row and promptly put it back in, but he'll never crack the rotation if he's going to remain such a liability from the charity stripe.
Potapenko was awful. That sequence where he missed that wide open layup after that nice dish by Cleaves, then immediately followed that with a wide open 10 footer that went 15, followed by his man getting an offensive board and layup....just awful. And not to bring up Game 6 last year again, but he seems to be a step or 3 slow on his rotations. Against Boston he totally lost Scalabrine at the end of the quarter for a wide open 3. Also, why is it we can't seem to get guys open on screens? Utah was picking our guys off all night, actually most teams seem to be able to get any shot they want against us. And last, Kris Humphries is another guy we could've had instead of Swift, I believe. Not that he's going to be world beater but he did a nice job on D against Rashard in the post for a few minutes and looked quick and athletic for his size.
Reggie was an energy boost, and he played pretty good individual defense. He killed us with missed free throws and one refusal to rotate late in the game. Palacio beat the PG (can't remember if it was Luke or Mateen), which is sad in and of itself, but the Jazz had cleared out and Reggie could have cut off the drive, but he stepped, reached and ran back to his man...leaving the ENTIRE left side of the floor unguarded. Palacio got an easy layin. Nick had to leave his man and run from the outside on the right side of the floor but had no chance to get there in time. Nick gave Reggie a seriously NASTY stare down as they walked back up court but did not say a thing. I could feel his fury from the 200 level. That lack of team defensive rotation is why Reggie has been benched and his free throw failures are why he doesn't play the end of games.
<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">"We thought it was going to be an easy game and it turned out to be not easy at all," said Vladimir Radmanovic, who had just two points.</div> For this team to take anybody lightly is laughable
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Roland Hood:</div><div class="quote_post">For this team to take anybody lightly is laughable</div> Hey man, it's the NBA. the weakest players on any team are among the best players in the world. It doesn't matter who you are...Indiana is a great team and they just got SPANKED by Charlotte. Every game needs to be won from the first two minutes through to the last two minutes. Vlade is just demonstrating how little he has learned in the past three years.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Seattle.:</div><div class="quote_post">I'm pretty sure that was his point. We shouldn't be taking anyone lightly.</div> Agreed, and my point was that no NBA team should take any other team lightly, not just the Sonics.
I agree to an extent. But lets say you're the Spurs. Or Miami with Shaquille. Detroit even. And you go against, say, Atlanta. Or Toronto. Or maybe OK/NO. Hell Seattle on the road I can see them taking these games lightly, especially at home, and they can still win because of their talent level, chemistry, experience and the system they run. We have none of those, at least at this point in the season. We're a team of jump shooters that run hot and cold, play horrible defense and have no post presence on offense or defense. So for Vlad and the rest of the guys (according to Weiss in the paper today) to think we're good enough to coast through a home game, and after getting destroyed by an average of 30 pts not more than 5 games ago is, as I said, laughable. If Shaquille said it, or Timmy, I'd say, yeah I can understand that. But not Rashard or Ray or anyone on the Supes, and especially not Vlad.
