coaching in Houston game

[day1]

I thought RUDY TOMJANOVICH did a great job in the first half against the Mavs. Thank goodness we also have a very smart coaching staff, and at halftime made adjustments. Rudy didn't have any more tricks in his bag and we were able to win the game. Rudy definitely took advantage of our vulnerability when Shawn had to sit with three fouls early in the first half. But in the second half Don used Najera and his leaping ability and hustle to neutralize Yao.

Really, I thought this was a well coached game on both sides. You watch other teams play and it seems the coaches aren't creative enough to play the chessmatch that is professional sports.

[dude1394]

Rudy is one of the class acts and great coaches in the nba... I think they also did a nice job, it was quite a chess match. Bradley goes out, yao comes in and torches our zone, yao lets eddie play outside in the first half and williams comes in to pull yao out.

Then during the second half nellie/staff obviously made some adjustments because yao was pretty ineffective the rest of the way.

[Chiwas]

Sorry guys, I was lost opening other thread. My commentary:


<< "It wasn't easy," Nelson said. "Shawn ran into foul trouble, and we finally went with a box-and-one defense on Yao and that seemed to work best. Eddie was really sensational, and we relied on our zone to take care of the other guys." >>

I had read this several times without understand the point. Then I read a quote from Francis saying bad things about the Mavs zone just a moment after this zone beat them. I found the answer. They never realized that Mavs weren´t playing a real zone in the second half! Not even knew it after the game! Mavs played a "box and one" defense that isn't the zone defense mentioned by Francis. It's the Nelson-Harris plus "Dirk was behind me to help me out" defense. This team is great, including the staff.