Tag: Tim Duncan

Wait almost over for Spurs

By Jeff McDonald

Blame the Los Angeles Clippers for whiffing twice in their bid to close out the Memphis Grizzlies. Blame the Grizzlies for their stubborn and steadfast refusal to go quietly.

Blame the Utah Jazz for putting up all the resistance of soaked newsprint in their first-round series with the Spurs. Blame the Spurs for the ruthless efficiency with which they swept away the Jazz.

Whoever is to blame for the Spurs’ prolonged break between playoff rounds — and there is plenty to go around — this is what is most important now:

The end, thank goodness, is nigh.

“I think everybody pretty much wants to get back on the floor and play,” Spurs guard Danny Green said.

Game 1 of the Western Conference semifinals is set for Tuesday at 8:30 p.m. at the ATT Center. All that is missing now is an opponent.

By dinnertime tonight, that devilish detail should be finalized, too. Either the Grizzlies or the Clippers will win Game 7 in Memphis, slated for a noon tipoff, then will not pass “Go” en route to San Antonio for the start of the next round.

“I really don’t care who we play,” Spurs captain Tim Duncan said. “Whatever it might be, they’re going to figure it out themselves. We’re just going to be here waiting.”

And waiting.

When the Spurs finally take the floor again for Game 1, it will have been eight days since finishing off the sweep in Utah.

With such a long layoff, the Spurs are at least certain to start the next round completely healthy, afflicted by no malady save for cabin fever.

To pass the time, coach Gregg Popovich has staged a pair of full-squad scrimmages in the team’s practice gym, complete with referees. After the Grizzlies and Clippers dispense with their series this afternoon, the Spurs will reconvene for their first opponent-specific practice of the break.

“I think guys are getting a little excited to see who’s going to be next up,” Green said. “Playoffs are a big deal. We want to get back to them as quick as we can.”

By the time the Spurs returned from Utah early Tuesday morning, the fifth-seeded Clippers had forged a surprising 3-1 lead in their series. There was hope among Spurs players and coaches that the second round might be soon in the offing.

But the Clippers have since squandered two chances to finish the fourth-seeded Grizzlies — including once in Los Angeles in Game 6 — pushing the series to the limit.

Now that their two potential opponents have arrived at a do-or-die seventh game, the Spurs have expressed no public preference for which they prefer.

A matchup with Memphis would bring a rematch of last year’s first-round series, when the Grizzlies — then a No. 8 seed — stunned the top-seeded Spurs. A meeting with the Clippers would summon a pair of Western Conference All-Star starters to the second-round stage in Chris Paul and Blake Griffin.

In the regular season, the Spurs went 4-0 against Memphis and 2-1 against the Clippers, who on March 9 became one of only five visitors this year to win at the ATT Center.

“But both teams play very hard, good defensively, good defense on the bigs,” Spurs guard Manu Ginobili said. “Whoever we play will be really tough.”

At long last, the Spurs can fill in that last remaining blank this afternoon.

“It’s going to be nice to get back on the floor so we can get back in the flow of things,” Green said. “It’s the playoffs. Nobody wants to be sitting at home watching games. We want to be part of it.”

jmcdonald@express-news.net
Twitter: @JMcDonald_SAEN

SPURS VS. CLIPPERS OR GRIZZLIES

Game 1: @Spurs, Tuesday, 8:30 p.m., TNT

Game 2: @Spurs, Thursday, 8:30 p.m., ESPN

Game 3: @Clippers or Grizzlies, Saturday, 2:30 pm., ABC

Game 4: @Clippers or Grizzlies, Sunday, 9:30 p.m. or 7 p.m., TNT

*Game 5: @Spurs, May 22 (Tuesday), TNT

*Game 6: @Clippers or Grizzlies, May 24 (Thursday), ESPN

*Game 7: @Spurs, May 27 (Sunday), TNT

* if necessary

Spurs notebook: Jazz’s Jefferson can’t see any team beating S.A.

SALT LAKE CITY — For three games in the Western Conference playoffs, Utah center Al Jefferson has seen his team beaten every which way, and by a combined 58 points.

Finally, he has seen enough.

Before Sunday’s practice, Jefferson essentially declared the Spurs to be NBA champions-in-waiting.

“I just think we’re playing against a team that is at its peak,” Jefferson said. “I don’t see nobody beating them.”

Jefferson’s comments were striking, considering Utah’s series with the Spurs is still in progress.

Game 4 is tonight in Utah.

Apprised of Jefferson’s prediction after their own practice session at EnergySolutions Arena, the Spurs seemed flattered, but deemed it premature.

“The best team out there won’t be decided for a while yet,” coach Gregg Popovich said. “We’ve got a lot of work to do if we want to be that team, and we’re trying.”

It is a one-game-at-a-time approach echoed by Popovich’s captain, Tim Duncan, even with the Spurs on the verge of sweeping a playoff series for the first time since the 2007 NBA Finals against the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Even with the Spurs going 41-7 since Jan. 30.

“We’re still growing a little bit,” Duncan said. “It’s early in the playoffs. We have some ways to go before we can define what kind of team we’re going to be.”

Jefferson thinks he knows the Spurs’ ceiling. Whether he’s correct will be determined over the next six weeks or so.

“Right now, they just playing well, man,” Jefferson said. “I ain’t never seen nothing like this.”

Checkmate for Parker: Jazz coach Tyrone Corbin made his first strategic move of the series in Game 3 when he assigned 6-foot-8 small forward Gordon Hayward to guard Tony Parker for long stretches.

The move might have backfired.

Not only did it fail to faze Parker — who finished with 27 points to raise his average in the series to 24.3 — it seemed to take Hayward out of his own game. Hayward ended with four points and made just 1 of 10 shots.

Parker, meanwhile, pumped in 16 points in the fourth quarter to put the game away.

“He’s kind of seen it all,” Duncan said. “I thought (Hayward) did a pretty good job early on, affecting him with his size a little bit, but Tony figured it out.”

Other ways to help: Manu Ginobili’s shooting struggles continued with a 2-for-6 night in Game 3. Yet he still found a way to contribute to the Spurs’ 102-90 victory with a season-high 10 assists.

“Whether it’s a rebound or scoring or assists, making a steal, he figures out what needs to be done in a game,” Popovich said. “Those 10 assists really helped us.”

Ginobili is still looking for his first made 3-pointer in eight tries in the series, and the 17 points he’s totaled have been surpassed by seven teammates.

As long as the Spurs’ offense is humming — and it’s averaging 107.3 points in the playoffs so far — Ginobili is content to be a setup man.

“The team is playing good offense,” he said. “Tony is taking us where we want to be. There’s no need to force the issue to try to make shots.”

jmcdonald@express-news.net

Twitter: @JMcDonald_SAEN

Spurs’ smooth progression to 2-0 lead

By Jeff McDonald

Danny Green snatched a rebound late in the first half Wednesday. Then he got excited, and went deep.

Looking to hit a streaking Tony Parker on a fly pattern, Green miscalculated and sailed the ball into the Utah bench. After the turnover, still early in the Spurs’ 114-83 Game 2 romp at the ATT Center, Green didn’t even bother to look at his coach.

Just his point guard.

“I was like, ‘Damn, Tony,’” Green recalled later, laughing. “You could have made me look a little better.”

This was the Spurs’ evening in a nutshell. Their biggest failing was that their All-Star point guard wasn’t 8 feet tall.

Everything else went their way, starting with a 20-0 run in the second quarter and ending with a 2-0 series lead that for the Jazz must only feel insurmountable.

Seven players scored in double figures for the Spurs, who led 53-28 at half en route to the third-largest playoff victory in franchise history. It was the Spurs’ most lopsided win in the postseason win since a 34-point trouncing of Sacramento in 2006.

“For whatever reason, we just let them do whatever they wanted to do,” Utah forward Gordon Hayward said.

As is becoming clearer with each passing moment in the series, the Jazz might not have much of a say in the matter. After closing the regular season by winning 10 in a row, the Spurs have extended it to a 12-game winning streak, technically their longest of the season.

Whatever adjustments the Jazz made on Parker — going under screens, switching on pick and rolls and hedging harder with their big men — it didn’t seem to work.

Parker finished with 18 points and nine assists in less than 28 minutes, and would have logged less playing time had Popovich had his way. Late in the third quarter, Popovich sent Patrick Mills to the scorer’s table to replace him.

After a brief on-court debate during a Utah free throw, Parker convinced Popovich to leave him a few more minutes, and waved Mills back to the bench.

“When you have a game like this, it’s always a struggle between keeping someone in shape and not letting them get hurt,” Popovich said.

These are the worries of a coach ahead by 38 points in the second half of a playoff game.

The Spurs got a 12-point, 13-rebound double-double from their oldest player — 36-year-old Tim Duncan — but it was largely the work of their two youngest starters that set the fuse on the rout.

After looking overwhelmed early in Game 1, 20-year-old rookie small forward Kawhi Leonard and Green, a 24-year-old guard, nearly outscored Utah in the first half by themselves in Game 2. Leonard had 12 of his 17 points before intermission, while Green scored all 13 of his.

In all, Leonard had made 6 of his 7 shots, including 3 of 4 3-pointers. It was an offensive bonus for a player drafted for his defense and rebounding.

“They need me to knock down shots if I’m wide open,” said Leonard, who had netted 17 points just three times before. “I’m not out there to miss shots.”

Ostensibly, neither is Al Jefferson, Utah’s center and leading scorer. Wednesday, he proved pretty adept at misfiring anyway.

Flummoxed by a steady diet of Spurs double teams, Jefferson went 5 of 15 for 10 points, part of a night in which the Jazz were shooting below 30 percent into the fourth quarter.

“We made shots and they couldn’t throw it in the ocean,” Popovich said. “It happens to all of us.”

Before he’d even vacated the postgame podium Wednesday, Popovich was already guarding against overconfidence heading into Game 3 on Saturday in Salt Lake City.

“This is nothing to be satisfied about,” he said. “When we get up to Utah, the balls will fall for them. So we have to play a lot better.”

Given the chance, Utah coach Tyrone Corbin would be willing to swap problems. As the series shifts to Salt Lake this weekend, the Jazz can look forward to at least one silver lining.

Unless Parker sprouts another 2 feet between now and then, the Spurs are unlikely to play much better than this.

jmcdonald@express-news.net
Twitter: @JMcDonald_SAEN

SPURS LEAD BEST-OF-7 SERIES 2-0

Game 1:

Game 2:

Game 3 Saturday: Spurs @Jazz, 9 p.m.
TV: FSNSW, TNT Radio: WOAI-AM 1200; KCOR-AM 1350?

Game 4 Monday: Spurs @Jazz, TBD
TV: FSNSW, TBD Radio: WOAI-AM 1200; KCOR-AM 1350?

* Game 5 Wednesday: Jazz @Spurs, TBD
TV: FSNSW, TBD Radio: WOAI-AM 1200; KCOR-AM 1350?

* Game 6 May 11: Spurs @Jazz, TBD
TV: FSNSW, TBD Radio: WOAI-AM 1200; KCOR-AM 1350?

* Game 7 May 13: Jazz @Spurs, TBD
TV: TBD Radio: WOAI-AM 1200; KCOR-AM 1350?

* — As needed in best-of-7 series