Los Angeles Lakers head coach Frank Vogel will make the NBA Finals for the first time in his coaching career. The defensive-minded coach has certainly played a huge part in propelling the Lakers to where they are right now – four wins from capturing the 2020 NBA title.
Vogel has transformed this Los Angeles squad into an elite defensive team and this has been their recipe for success in these playoffs. The Purple and Gold finished the regular season No. 3 in terms of defensive rating. Lakers superstar Anthony Davis revealed that the New Jersey native spends tons of hours watching film and coming up with schemes.
“(Vogel) spends hours and hours of watching film, breaking down games, schemes, figuring out what’s the best recipe for us to be successful,” Davis said, via Anthony Slater of The Atheltic. “He puts the right players on the floor at the right time. He trusts us that, if someone has it going and he wants to sub someone in, and (we say) ‘Let that unit roll or let that guy keep rolling,’ he trusts us.
“He’s a defensive-minded coach. He’s all about defensive rating. It shows. We are a defensive team.”
The Lakers defensive anchor added that Vogel always makes it a point to change things up on the defensive end.
“He’s always, as he calls it, changing up the pitches,” Davis said of Vogel. “We never give a steady diet. We change it up. Give different looks.”
These, apparently, are the main reasons why he's been so great in his first season with the Lakers.
After multiple attempts of making the Finals with the Indiana Pacers, Vogel now gets his chance, ironically with LeBron James, the same person who repeatedly denied him before.
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