The Ryen Russillo Podcast
Rudy’s Diabolical Game 5, LAC-DEN Preview, and Whether or Not to Call Dad After a Playoff Loss With Austin Rivers
Thu, 01 May 2025
Russillo starts the show with his thoughts on the Timberwolves closing out the Lakers in five games (1:27). Then he’s joined by Austin Rivers to discuss why the Lakers had no chance in their series, why things become more difficult for Harden in the playoffs, and whether the Bucks need to consider trading Giannis this offseason (20:00). Plus, Life Advice with Kyle (1:06:28)! Is it bad manners to poop in someone’s house before the owners do? Check us out on YouTube for exclusive clips, livestreams, and more at https://www.youtube.com/@RyenRussilloPodcast. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Host: Ryen Russillo Guest: Austin Rivers Producers: Steve Ceruti, Kyle Crichton, Mike Wargon, and Jonathan Frias Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: What were Russillo's thoughts on the Timberwolves closing out the Lakers?
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RG-Help.com On today's episode of the podcast, Minnesota in five. What happened? It was impressive. It was also sort of non-impressive, at least with last night, except for one man. Maybe two men. So we'll get into breaking that down. I have more on the rest of the playoffs, including Denver, up 3-2 on the Clippers. Houston taking game five at home.
And some of the other stuff from the East with our guy Austin Rivers. And we'll talk a little bit about his dad. And that awful loss from Milwaukee ending their season. And we've got life advice. That was impressive, but it kind of wasn't. Minnesota should have won that game by 30 points last night. Timberwolves close out the Lakers in five games.
And they closed out last night because of one, Rudy Gobert. Yeah, 27-24. You probably know that by now, but if you don't, you're like, what? For the series? No, no. Last night, he was a beast. For somebody that is not always beastly. So let's get to my thoughts and why I thought I should have been 30. At one point, starting the fourth quarter, Minnesota was up one, 81-80.
And the whole second half, they were up 10 at the half. I just expected they would finally start hitting threes. They'd pull away by 20, maybe a 20-plus point win. Not necessarily how I felt at the beginning because you never really know what Luka would get to his injury. You always wonder if LeBron is capable of doing something really special again like he'd done earlier in the series.
There's always the shooting variance part of it, but the first few minutes of the game, I'm like, this is not a solvable problem, I don't believe, for the Lakers. And Minnesota's defense was really good. Their energy was terrific. I love whenever you're pushing.
I just think transition is almost underrated, even though the math tells us that points per possession in transition – granted, maybe you're baking in a lot of just the turnover fast breaks with no defense whatsoever, but that –
That kind of non-fast break transition where you make them chase the matchups, especially LeBron who's not going to chase everybody and match up Luka who can just be absolutely lost out there. And if you have anyone with any kind of size and any momentum going up against the small Lakers lineup, there's just a lot of points.
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Chapter 2: What challenges did the Lakers face against the Timberwolves?
Thank you, Coach.
Now, I'll start here. I like JJ. I wouldn't classify our relationship as friends, but I like him. And it's funny, when he started on TV, we have a really good mutual friend. He goes, you know, JJ and you are a lot alike.
And I thought, well... Let me think here.
Other than the basketball accolades, the looks, 118 million in career earnings, a head coaching job in the NBA, a degree from Duke, and the hair. Yeah, I'd say maybe the exact same guy. The question I thought was really, the tone of it was fine, but it was very clear that it was kind of a fucked question.
Like, hey, you talk to your assistants this time around, you know, as if when JJ was playing the entire same five for second half that we've never seen before. Like if you're going to be say this all the time, but if you're going to be different and lose, you will have only lost because you were different for no any other reason. So you're better just with the way people react to everything.
You're almost better in life now. being the same and wrong as opposed to being different and wrong. So JJ does something different. He thinks it's, it's only out throughout this entire series. It doesn't work. So a lot of this, I think locally in LA, it's going to be a big discussion. I'm sure nationally becomes the main talking point because the way JJ handled that ends up being like,
You know, that's an assumption. I understood why he was upset because I do think it's a little like, hey, you going to check in with anybody? Because if his assistants the whole game are like, do you want to talk to him? Like, why would he talk? What is he doing? He's his own man. He won't listen to us. Clearly, these guys talk all the time and he thought it was his best, best scenario.
And it didn't work. And by the way, if they had played Jackson Hayes like a little bit more like there was, I don't think there was any sub pattern here that was going to solve the problem. Now, if you want to get on JJ's case for needing to handle it a little bit better, because when I saw it and saw the video the first time, I'm like, they better win tonight.
Because if they lose, then this will be part of it. And this will be like brought up later on because they just don't see it a ton. So I think part of the job is, even though I would agree with JJ feeling slighted by it, part of the job and the seasoning is handling the questions that you know are kind of stupid. All right. What do we do with LeBron?
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Chapter 3: How did Rudy Gobert perform in the playoffs?
We just beat OKC. We beat this team by a good margin game one. Like you said, it was like 15 or something, whatever it was. We have a good win. We're talking trash. Yeah, we went to the locker room thinking we're going to win the championship. That's what we thought. And we were looking at the East at that time, which there was nothing over there.
So we were like, if we could beat a couple, we got a couple more series and then we're in the finals. We're running through the East. That's how we felt. Obviously, the tides changed quickly.
Okay, so this is a good pivot, though, because I want to talk Clippers Denver. I thought the Clippers, you know, sometimes when I think about Minnesota and LA, I felt like Minnesota had no public momentum, no national momentum, and they finished really strong. And they were the healthiest they had been all year. And it felt like LA had all this momentum.
national momentum because they had that 18 and three stretch and even if they felt like they weren't the same team to close it's like okay but we saw the best version of them and we saw how good their defense can be with preparation and all these things and then it's like okay well that that didn't work out the Clippers you know I picked the Clippers I didn't think Denver had enough defensive stuff on the perimeter to match up with all the Clippers options and
And yet I'm sitting here going, Denver's up 3-2. And you could make it as simple as Jokic maybe in game four, but Murray reminding us of his playoff ceiling in game five was a big part of it. I mean, they were dominant in game five. I think it was bad defense by the Clippers, but I also think it was incredible shot making.
And so it wasn't necessarily the superhero Jokic game that basically his baseline is a superhero game, but like it was a little extra in that game four. Are you surprised Denver's up 3-2 in this series?
I am. I am. I thought they'd be outmatched on the perimeter. Again, we just talked about depth with the Lakers. When you look at Denver and the pieces they've lost over the years, whether it's been KCP, Bruce Brown, obviously Jeff Green's older now, but he was a big piece there a couple years ago. They've lost valued, experienced, playoff play guys. And they've inserted kind of young players
whether it's Peyton Watson, P. Watt, Christian Braun, these guys who I haven't seen that consistency of playthrough, I did question them. I also questioned Jamal a little bit. We haven't seen the same Jamal consistently, to be honest. Although Jamal is a different player in the playoffs, this year he's actually had a solid year.
But like we saw last year in the previous play, even the Olympics this year with Canada, I didn't know what... we had left with Jamal and I'm looking at this team on totality and where they're at. And I'm like, I don't know if they have the perimeter scoring, the perimeter defense to be able to keep up with Jamal.
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