Tag: Dallas

Game rewind: Two point guards are better than one

Here’s a look at how the Spurs escaped with a 101-95 victory over Golden State Wednesday night.

Game analysis: The Spurs employed a scoring-by-committee rotation to help overcome their first game without scoring leader Manu Ginobili. It looked ugly at times, but the Spurs caught fire in the fourth quarter when they needed to win the game.

Where the game was won: Golden State was ahead 88-84 with 5:53 left when Gregg Popovich inserted Tony Parker into the lineup to play with T.J. Ford in the same backcourt. The two guards helped spark the Spurs on an immediate 11-2 run, finishing by hitting all six of their shots in the fourth quarter.

Player of the game: Golden State guard Monta Ellis erupted for a season-high 38 points and added seven assists in a losing cause. He eventually wore down at the end of the game after chasing Parker across the court and playing 44 minutes for the Warriors.

Player of the game II: Parker came up big at the end, scoring 10 points in the final 5:53 to lead the Spurs’ comeback. Parker finished with a team-high 21 points and eight assists.

Player of the game III: Tim Duncan filled the statistic sheet with his strongest all-around game of the season. Duncan had 15 points and 11 rebounds, including six caroms in six minutes in the fourth quarter. He also was a disruptive force defensively with three steals and three blocked shots.

Most unsung: Danny Green. For the second straight game, Green provided the team with a defensive lift. He shackled Ellis in the fourth quarter, forcing him to miss five of his final seven shots after a blistering start.

Most glum looking person in the ATT Center: Ginobili. As his team trailed for most of the game, Ginobili looked like he would rather have been anywhere but sitting on the bench in his street clothes. Or maybe he might have been a little worried about his impending visit to the surgeon Thursday morning.

Stat of the game: The Spurs shot 70.6 percent from the field in the fourth quarter, while the Warriors shot 35.0 percent in the fourth quarter.

Stat of the game II: Through the first three quarters, Golden State shot 50 percent from the field. The Spurs shot 41 percent after three quarters.

Stat of the game III: The Spurs are now 4-0 at home. That mark ties them with Denver and Orlando for the most home victories without a loss.

Weird stat of the game: After trailing in fast break points 12-4 after three quarters, the Spurs outraced the Warriors 10-3 in the fourth quarter to take control of the game.

Quote of the game: ”Luckily, Steph Curry got hurt. When those guys were shooting like that, we were in for a long night,” Spurs guard Danny Green, describing the difficulties of  trying to contain Curry and Ellis in the Golden State backcourt.

How the schedule stacked up: The Spurs will play a rare home back-to-back when defending NBA champion Dallas visits Thursday night.  It will be the second game in the middle of an arduous stretch of four games in five days. The Warriors started three games in four nights with an upcoming back-to-back Friday night at the Lakers and Saturday night at home against Utah.

Injuries: Ginobili missed his first game with a fractured fifth left metacarpal. Gary Neal returned to the lineup after missing the first five games of the season with an appendectomy. Golden State guard Stephen Curry sustained a sprained right ankle with 2:49 left in the third quarter and did not return. Golden State forward David Lee returned to the lineup after missing Monday’s game with a bout of food poisioning. He produced 13 points and 10 rebounds in 38 minutes of play.

Spurs seek more ugly wins during grueling schedule

After the Spurs laid waste to the defending NBA champion Dallas Mavericks on Thursday night, Tim Duncan took the extraordinary step of conducting his post-game media session seated in front of his locker, instead of his customary spot standing in another corner of the room.

In this lockout-compressed season, in which most every night is game night, it seems any amount of wear and tear saved on Duncan’s 35-year-old knees is a worthwhile investment.

“Hopefully, we can get a lot of games like this, so we can rest guys and not wear ourselves out,” Duncan said after the Spurs’ convincing 93-71 victory.

What the Spurs will take in this 66-game sprint of a season are wins — any which way they come.

With star guard Manu Ginobili out for the next six weeks with a fractured shooting hand, and with the schedule starting to stack up on them, the Spurs see no reason to quibble with the scoreboard.

Playing on the second night of a back-to-back Thursday, the Spurs missed 52 of 86 shots against Dallas, becoming only the 16th team since 1985 to win a game by at least 22 points while shooting worse than 40 percent.

They did so, in part, because the Mavericks — the oldest team in the NBA — were also playing for the second time in as many nights, and went 27 for 77 from the field, including 1 for 19 from the 3-point arc.

“It doesn’t matter how you win, ugly or pretty, so long as you win,” said guard Gary Neal, providing the mantra for the season.

Not-so-fresh off that not-so-pretty win over Dallas, the Spurs tonight open another back-to-back — at home against Denver, then on to Oklahoma City — sure to test both their physical conditioning and mental toughness.

It will mark the third of 17 back-to-back sets this season. The Spurs will also face a pair of back-to-back-to-backs.

Youthful and nimble and deep, neither the Nuggets nor the Thunder represent the preferred fare for a gassed Spurs team amid a four-games-in-five-nights stretch.

“You’ve just got to dig deep,” said backup point guard T.J. Ford. “This season is going to be about mental toughness, and it’s only going to get tougher.”

Now more than ever, style points are irrelevant. Across the NBA, the art of winning ugly is en vogue.

Of course, the Spurs knew that from the moment the shrinky-dinked schedule was announced in early December, none of them more keenly than Duncan and coach Gregg Popovich.

Both were around in 1999, when the NBA’s last lockout shriveled the season to 50 games. Of course, Duncan was then only 23 years old.

“I was running up and down like a deer,” Duncan said. “I wanted to play every day.”

The Spurs lost just 13 games that season en route to claiming the franchise’s first NBA title, but five of those defeats came after playing the night before. Overall in 1999, the Spurs were 10-5 either on the second night of a back-to-back, or the third night of a back-to-back-to-back.

Popovich came into this season with a plan to play more players and minimize minutes for older veterans. So far, he’s seen no reason to deviate from that prescription.

“You play to win, but you don’t want to drive anybody into the ground,” Popovich said.

For Duncan — the only player older than 31 on the Spurs’ suddenly fresh-faced active roster, now that Ginobili is out — that’s meant playing past the 30-minute mark only once in seven games. In all, 12 Spurs players are averaging double digits in minutes.

“I think everybody is feeling good about that part of it,” Duncan said. “It’s a long season. Pop understands that.”

If it keeps Duncan off his feet, and the ugly wins piling up, the Spurs will take it.

“Every team has to go through those stretches,” Duncan said. “We just have to find a way to fight through them.”

Spurs roadkill again in OKC

By Jeff McDonald
jmcdonald@express-news.net

OKLAHOMA CITY — The Spurs knew, as every team in the NBA knows, there would be nights like this.

There would be times, during this cruel and unusual schedule that borders on a violation of the Eighth Amendment, when their legs wouldn’t be there, their lungs would be burning, and their gas tank would be empty.

That doesn’t mean they have to like it.

“You definitely don’t concede anything,” guard Gary Neal said Sunday after Oklahoma City walloped the Spurs 108-96. “We came here to win. It just got away from us.”

True, the Spurs were playing their fourth game in five nights, with the promise of another back-to-back coming around the bend.

But they knew better than to overplay the exhausted card. Not on this night. Not with Oklahoma City on the floor for the third night in a row and yet still summoning the energy to run the Spurs out of Chesapeake Energy Arena.

Kevin Durant had an efficient 21 points and 10 rebounds, while James Harden added 20 points to spearhead a relentless Oklahoma City bench attack, as the Thunder became the first team this season to sweep a back-to-back-to-back.

Teams are now 6-0 on the third night in such a scenario, but before Sunday — when Oklahoma City followed two victories over Houston by thumping the Spurs — no team had claimed the trifecta.

“I thought we had good energy,” said Oklahoma City coach Scott Brooks, whose team snapped a six-game losing streak to the Spurs. “The defense was really good, the offense was really good, and we were getting out in transition.”

The Spurs arrived in the Sooner State playing with house money. They had won three in a row since losing star guard Manu Ginobili to a broken hand, including back-to-back home wins over a pair of Western Conference playoff teams, Dallas and Denver.

They leave Oklahoma City for Tuesday’s game at Milwaukee still winless on the road, dropping three away games by an average of 12 points.

Though the Spurs (6-3) played hard, and at times a little chippy, it became clear early in the second half that Sunday wasn’t going to be their night.

A 25-8 third-quarter run from the Thunder, highlighted by a run-and-gun lob from Durant to Russell Westbrook, pushed what had been a six-point Oklahoma City lead at halftime as high as 25.

The Thunder (8-2) outscored the Spurs 37-21 in the third and carried an 81-69 lead into the fourth.

“They kicked our butts in the third quarter,” said Spurs coach Gregg Popovich, who sat all his starters except Neal in the fourth.

Unlike during the Spurs’ three-game, Ginobili-less winning streak, their bench didn’t provide much meaningful help Sunday.

Rookie Kawhi Leonard had 13 points and 10 rebounds for his first double-double, while Tiago Splitter added 10 points.

Fresh off a breakout 24-point game against Denver, reserve guard Danny Green finished with six points, going scoreless until he made a pair of 3-pointers in the final minutes.

Boosted by 14 first-half points from Harden, and an unexpected contribution from Nick Collison (12 points, 10 rebounds, two dunks), the Thunder bench kept the Spurs at bay until the third-quarter eruption.

“They made shots, and we didn’t,” said point guard Tony Parker, who scored four points on 1-of-8 shooting before leaving the game with a bruised leg early in the third.

“In the NBA, especially against a team like that, it can go fast.”

All in all, it was a forgettable night for the Spurs, but therein lies the beauty of a lockout-compressed season.

With another back-to-back coming around the corner, beginning Tuesday in Milwaukee, Sunday will be easy for the Spurs to forget.

“They come so fast, you can’t worry about this one,” Parker said. “You give them credit and move on to the next game.”