that final play

[chumdawg]

I've watched that final play about 30 times now, and I don't think that it was a play designed for Finley and Finley only. They say they have run the play time and time again, so I guess somebody here might recognize it and know more about what the options were. But here's what I saw, and my thinking about it.

First of all, like Doug Collins I expected that Nellie might look for a three in that situation. I also expected that (especially if they wanted a three) they would try to run more clock down if they weren't trying to get a quick two and then foul.

So Finley takes the inbound. Nash is way in the corner on the other side of the court. Daniels and Najera are baseline. Dirk runs out to get the inbounds pass. He then hands it off to Finley, who goes to the top of the key, and then disappears on the right side of the floor.

Nash is still in the corner, and now that Dirk has moved off to the right, Finley is isolated in the middle. But he's very high, outside the three point line. He's covered, but I wonder if the plan wasn't for him to shoot a three there if the defense sagged.

Nash spots up in the corner, just behind the three point line. Christie stays on him. Nash puts his hands on his hips. It looks like the plan is for Finley to burn some clock. And Nash obviously isn't going anywhere.

Then Finley penetrates, and I think the plan was for Christie to come over and help, at which time Finley would kick it over to Nash for the three.

When Christie doesn't leave Nash, Fin goes to pull up on Peja, and Nash runs around behind him toward the top of the key, still behind the three-point line. Finley could have passed it then, and Nash probably would have had an open look.

But Finley did that "assertive" thing (that others have blamed Dirk for not doing) and decide to take it on his own. That's the way I see it. Even for Nellie, it doesn't make any sense not to at least start the play with the ball in Nash's hands...unless you were setting up the play for him.

I know that they didn't say anything about this after the game, but you can't trust them to say everything to the media. I think they supported Fin because they had no other choice, but I think Fin didn't do what he was supposed to do. I read a quote from him in another thread where he said something like "I know what I did wrong."