OKC is a matchup nightmare | NBA Finals Game 5 analysis

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This detailed film breakdown & scouting report examines how the Thunder defense held Tyrese Haliburton to 4 points in Game 5 of the 2025 NBA Finals, along with the keys to Jalen Williams huge game.

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Music by Nemesis

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[Music] in game five of the nba finals jaylen williams exploded she gilgis alexander turned into a playmaking machine and the thunder survived the tj mcconnell takeover along with another great pascal seakum game but the biggest story was okc holding tyrese hallebertton to four points on just 0 for six shooting hallebertton strained his calf about 5 minutes into the game so he wasn’t 100% but this thunder lockdown has extended through multiple games and is primarily the result of a tactical advantage they have matching up with the pacers in the first three rounds of the playoffs indiana posted a 103 offensive rating when defenses switched a hallebertton pick and roll sometimes they were proactively switching with their good defenders and other times opponents were reactively switching and dealing with any mismatch that that created but against the thunder indiana’s offensive rating is 63 against these switches 63 that’s about 30 points below the worst halfcourt offense in the league this year so it’s an understatement to say okc switching has broken tyrese hallebertton’s pick and roll in game five nearly every successful hallebertton possession came against isaiah hartinstein because he rarely switches so hartinstein’s coverages will briefly put two defenders on the ball and howie can find open teammates from there here’s an example where hartinstein is dropped back off the screening action and it’s a great look for hallebertton that just rims out and here he goes after hartinstein by passing it and chasing it isaiah’s way out which creates confusion about whether it’s a switch and harley threads a beautiful pass for a layup so a minute later we get vintage hallebertton ball again resetting his dribble with the screener that pulls hartinstein out this time tyrese looks at the roller to move the corner defender over to help and that opens a teammate and is just great offense and we’ve also talked about the thunder denying hallebertton away from the ball that was a huge part of their comeback win in game four and whether it’s lou dort or kasein wallace one of the reasons he only had eight scoring attempts in game five was this offball denial and then indiana’s willingness to play through other initiators in those spots so here dort makes it difficult just to inbound the ball to him when he finally does come back and get it jdub is on miles turner precisely so he can switch to neuter the pick and roll and williams is too good defensively for him so he needs another screen and then it’s okc magic with jdub late switching to the shooter then caruso coming to plug the drive meanwhile williams peels off to caruso’s man and it’s a semicontestant three against the clock when hongren is involved he’s too mobile to create any mismatch so he can just switch as needed hallebertton’s stuck and this is actually the play he hurts himself trying to lose chat and again jdub was on turner there which effectively removes indiana’s best screener from the action because in this series involving williams in the screen has basically been a dead end for hallebertton now there were some moments in this one where we saw hallebertton pass up wide openen shots too and i don’t think this was all injury related either this is the first play of the game and when it comes around to him he’s not thinking score but wanting his teammate to get going but that switching was just devastating and kicked off a run of four straight steals in the fourth quarter on the second one hallebertton drove it into traffic against homegrren and made the worst possible pass and then on the third one caruso’s just a menace in passing lanes and then went with the full dave cowan’s face plant going after the ball that that is a 1974 reference for those keeping track anyway this isn’t just about homegrin or okc’s big men it’s about the entire team being able to switch guard to guard actions like this then go nowhere for indiana howie drags hartinstein into the play which looks promising but jdubs pulled over to help so the roll pass isn’t that enticing and then he’s just stuck and suddenly the entire shot clock has been drained on this possession this one’s out of a timeout and it’s a three-man spain screen and most teams just switch only the guards here but the thunder switch all three players in unison which is just beautiful and destroys the after timeout idea and so this is the matchup problem hi and indiana are dealing with because all league defenders switching all these quick hitting actions just basically takes away all their power even the way okc rotates can be devastating this time they mix it up by switching hartinstein sga is sealed so there’s room to drive but again jdub helps off that corner and here aaron nesmith looks wide open and normally in this spot when the corner defender pulls way over like that the nearest wing defender makes that rotation to the open shooter but the thunder are a different animal so the foul line defender rotates which keeps dort on hallebertton and then they somehow recover as fast as the ball the advantage is gone and even when hartinstein doesn’t switch that baseline help is there again and that pass needs to hit the shooter but instead it’s a very hard shot against a ton of pressure and here’s another unique one from game four where he draws hartinstein out dort can either late switch and stay on obi- toppen or recover to hallebertton but okc will also have a help defender rotate to tophin while dort then recovers to someone else it happens to hit his leg there for a run out and a big flagrant foul in that game tj mcconnell actually came in for hallebertton and took over the game for indiana late in the third and this is a totally different coverage he’s much quicker than hallebertton so he can hurt okc defenders in space and because he’s not much of a shooter the thunder defend him by going under all his screens even if it means leaving him open like this when they mixed it up with a switch tj was just in a flow state and kept on coming so even as okc adjusted their coverage defending him he was quick enough to do some damage against someone like homegrren in isolation and then when help comes he can create an easy look the problem for the pacers is that tj isn’t used to playing huge minutes at that blistering pace so he had to sit down after almost eight straight minutes of play and rick carile didn’t want to pull hallebertton in the fourth and he didn’t want to pull andrew nemhard because he needed him defensively on shay so that was mostly that for the tj flurry of course jaylen williams was the big star of this game and we’ve already seen how key he was defensively both on and off the ball and even on a miss this is great hustle in transition dort plays both the ball and the trailer asks wallace to come plug up hallebertton that that is mastery then jdub’s hustle erases an open three and c steps up to then recover and block it like he’s tim duncan williams’ speed continued to cause problems for the pacers fullcourt pressure attacking the backpedaling big men 40 feet from the hoop yes the pacers continue to hound okc in the back court and having williams bring it up with these backcourt screens is a major challenge for indiana’s traditional big men so even on a play like this where there’s no immediate ball pressure hartinstein sets the screen near the logo and now jaylen has a bunch of space to attack that slower big he was obviously very aggressive this game up faking and then just exploding downhill on this play but i thought his tempo was a major factor too changing pace under control in tight situations all night and this was probably the best i’ve seen him stopping and starting with crisp ball handling to pry open the defense they also use shay as a screener more in this game than at any point in the playoffs going to this spain action a few times for williams again the big change of pace gets him downhill and opens the put back for chad and here he keeps the dribble alive under pressure comes off the first screen and again a little hesitation move then avoids a charge with a crazy finish he actually needed an illegal same foot jump to navigate into that bank shot but he blended hard-nosed aggressiveness and really crisp moves with that pace and change of speed so well slowing up off the screen here reading how the defenders react then flicking it for an awesome dime he’s also so smart and forceful as a cutter hartinstein’s looking for someone so hallebertton cheats out to deny the pass jdub reads that and flies back door for a power jam and that was only one play after this split action where williams goes to screen for sga feels nesmith behind the action and just flies to the rim and that’s a great pass and my favorite cut of the game was on this popular out-of- bounds play nesmith expects williams to come off the screen to the corner bam he goes back door and it’s a three-point play this was actually indiana’s second most efficient game offensively of the series but it was also their second worst defensive game statistically and with shay gildas alexander pouring in 31 points and 10 assists along with four block shots in a game where the okc defense finished with a whopping 27 steals and blocks combined the thunder are now just one game away from an nba championship if you want to work in directly support this channel check out patreon.com/thinkingbasket thanks as always for all of your support and wherever you’re enjoying the finals from i hope that you are having a great day