The New Orleans Pelicans will also be undermined in the duel against the Golden State Warriors. Meanwhile, the Denver Nuggets and the Brooklyn Nets must each work overtime. Victor Oladipo and Domantas Sabonis shoot the New York Knicks.
The Nets got off to a good start, throwing a solid 42.3 per cent in the first quarter and winning 28-22, with Caris LeVert already having 7 points. The pistons were worse in the match and had problems with the scores. Only six of the first 20 throwing attempts were transformed by the team, in addition they only threw 20 percent of the three-way line.
However, the balance of power shifted quickly, and at the beginning of the second quarter they took the lead, dominating the section with a 38-26 lead. At halftime, the pistons increased their throwing rate to 38.5 per cent, still a problematic figure, and hit only six of their 20 attempts from downtown. Many of her points she scored on the free-throw line (14/19 FT). The team from Brooklyn also had problems sinking the throws from outside. Their triple quota was 26.7 percent, LeVert (19) with 13 points was the best scorer at the time half (60:54).
However, no team was able to set itself apart and this continued in the second half. With Detroit, that was mainly because Blake Griffin had hardly found his way into the game for a long time. So Brooklyn was able to turn the game around again in the last quarter and could have even decided it in the regular playing time, but all attempts went to the flutes. In the end it even took a threesome for the late equalizer by the good Spencer Dinwiddie (25 points).
The Guard then advanced to the hero in the Overtime, in which it went further cheerfully back and forth. With 7.1 seconds, it was another Dinwiddie threesome that gave Brooklyn the final lead and victory. This was the third consecutive defeat for Detroit after a good start to the season.
Dinwiddie was the top scorer, just ahead of Joe Harris (23) and LeVert (19). Among the pistons, Griffin (25), Andre Drummond (24 and 23 rebounds) and Reggie Jackson (21) attracted the most attention.
A must-see for the Pacers in the MSG, even though it was a hard piece of work. The Pacers began very efficiently and met 56.5 per cent in the first quarter, Domantas Sabonis met each of its six throws and had already 13 points on the account. But also the Knicks were very good at first. They won the second and third quarters mainly thanks to Tim Hardaway (37 points, 10/19 FG), who was very strong, and thus entered the final round with a narrow 4-point lead. But these weren’t supposed to be enough, which Victor Oladipo took care of.
The All-Star had to fight a bronchitis last and so he didn’t get into the game very well in New York, only he had collected 13 points up to the last point. Indiana was lucky that things went very differently for Sabonis – the Lithuanian played his best game as a professional so far and remained flawlessly out of the field throughout the match (30 points, 12/12 FG). But in the end it was Oladipo time again.
11 of his 24 points were marked by the Shooting Guard in the final round and dominated the Crunchtime with Offense and Defense. “The throws I normally make somehow didn’t fall today,” Oladipo said afterwards. “I had to find other ways to influence the game.” He was able to do that. After a steal against Hardaway he gave the Pacers the lead via Dunk and a little later he raised the score to 103:97 with a threesome.
Who would have expected so much excitement in this game? Surely not the nuggets, at least that’s what their sometimes risky appearance suggested. Against harmless bulls they missed the whole game to stand out. And even the overtime wasn’t a good enough wake-up call – they would have lost the game if Paul Millsap hadn’t been there. But one thing at a time.
Led by another strong Zach LaVine (28 points) and Rookie Wendell Carter (Career High 25), the Bulls fought their way back into the game after being trailing in the first quarter and causing the nuggets big problems. On the visitors’ side, Nikola Jokic was especially strong (22 points, 12 rebounds, 9 assists), but the otherwise offensive nuggets struggled with their efficiency, only 45.5 percent of their throws fell from the field and 26.9 percent from downtown.
So the game remained tight and Chicago had two minutes before the end with 6 points lead best cards to win the game. But Millsap, Gary Harris and Malik Beasley balanced out and after no team wanted to score in the last 1:07 minutes, they went into overtime. There a jumper from Justin Holiday let the Bulls cheer, because they led 1:26 minutes before the end now with 107:106 – but again it should not be enough.
Both sides threw tickets until the nuggets took a final break at 3.5 seconds on the clock. This resulted in a litter for Jokic, who missed – but Millsap was on the spot. The veteran grabbed the offensive rebound and put the putback in – Game Over! At 0.1 seconds on the clock, Chicago couldn’t turn and Denver had got away with a black eye.
Page 1: OT drama – Nuggets escape with blue eye from Chicago
Page 2: Curry and the Warriors Stay in Gala Form