Phil Jackson is defending his beloved triangle at all costs.
On Sunday afternoon, the Knicks president tweeted criticism about teams that rely heavily on 3-pointers, implying it isn’t the way to win a championship.
The higher-seeded Golden State Warriors, Houston Rockets and Atlanta Hawks trail in their respective second-round series — while the Cleveland Cavaliers are in a precarious 2-2 tie — after each ranking in the top 7 in the NBA during the regular season in 3-point attempts. (The Clippers, ranked sixth in that category, are one win from the conference finals.) These highly efficient offenses — including the one engineered by first-choice coach hire Steve Kerr with the league-best Warriors — are darlings of the NBA’s sabermetrics crowd.
Jackson elaborated his 2-point-shooting view that basketball was all about “penetration,” hypothesizing the Heat and Spurs — who squared off in each of the previous two NBA Finals — achieved their success by embracing some means of crashing to the basket.
Jackson’s 11 rings as a coach speak for themselves, but isn’t this a bit presumptuous for the “architect” of a team that just finished a 17-65 season?
