Ime Udoka’s Houston Rockets crew tied its first-round playoff sequence towards the Golden State Warriors at 3-3 on Friday. Each groups will now sq. off in a win-or-go-home setting on Sunday.
For Udoka, this is a chance to achieve some redemption. The final time he confronted Stephen Curry in a postseason setting was the 2022 NBA Finals, when Udoka was main the Boston Celtics. The then-rookie head coach obtained important criticism for instructing his gamers to go beneath screens when guarding the best shooter in league historical past.
Boston misplaced that sequence. Now in his second yr because the Rockets’ head coach, Udoka seems to have discovered a method to restrict Curry’s effectiveness.
Houston has restricted Curry and the remainder of the Warriors by working an progressive fashion of zone protection. The system blends ideas from a 2-3 zone and a few box-and-one ideas to create a hybrid method.
“It was out of necessity (creating the zone),” Udoka mentioned on Friday. “The communication might be even higher in our zone than in man-to-man. Clearly, we’re dominant with our dimension.”
