AT&T CENTER--Seated in front of the media in the locker room following the San Antonio Spurs 105-83 Game 1 victory over the Memphis Grizzlies, center Tim Duncan was prepared for the question before it was even asked.
"Two years---," the reporter began. As the two syllables left the reporter's mouth, Duncan's head shot back, his eyes rolling in mock disgust.
Two years ago a top-seeded San Antonio Spurs team was upset in the first round by these Memphis Grizzlies. No, that's not entirely accurate. Two years the Spurs were destroyed by the Grizzlies, bullied in the paint by the Marc Gasol-Zach Randolph tandem to such a degree that the Spurs carried the stigma of a soft interior team even as it rectified the problem almost immediately after their 2011 playoff exit.
"Even though it's been two years, when you go through a playoff series with a team, does that better prepare you to face them down the road?" the reporter asked.
"It gives you some experience," Duncan replied. "You know what you're getting into. The personal experience, playing against those guys, helps."
Heading into the Western Conference Finals, the San Antonio Spurs were prepared to answer questions about their rematch with these Grizzlies in more ways than one. Yes, the Grizzlies are a dominant inside team. No, these Spurs aren't the same team that lost in that first round. But perhaps more than any interview response the Spurs could have given, what they came most prepared with was a game plan.
Zach Randolph has been a significant force at times in these playoffs, stopping just short of the brilliant play he offered in 2011 by averaging 18 points and nine rebounds a game during this postseason. On Sunday, the Spurs held Randolph to two points and, even more telling, just eight shot attempts overall.
"They were disrupting my rhythm," Randolph said just moments after apologizing for his performance to teammates in the locker room.
The Spurs threw everything but the kitchen sink at Randolph in Game 1 of the Western Conference Finals, and just in case that didn't suffice, they threw Matt Bonner at him as well. Starting Duncan on Randolph—something that is only made possible by the emergence of Tiago Splitter, who has proven to be able to defend Gasol without constantly requiring a double team—showed the Spurs were intent on stopping Randolph from the start.
Duncan fought Randolph for position. On shot attempts the Spurs brought help, double teaming Randolph on box out attempts. They fronted Randolph, they swarmed, and they brought help before he could even catch the ball.
If the Memphis Grizzlies took advantage of the Spurs lack of size in 2011, the Spurs took advantage of the Memphis' lack of shooting on Sunday. Only one Grizzlies player connected from long range, Quincy Pondexter going 5-9 from behind the three-point line. The Spurs, mindful of their matchups, often left the weak side corner open, defenders completely ignoring Memphis shooters in favor of discouraging entry passes into the post.
"They did a great job of 'storming'," Grizzlies guard Tony Allen said. "They force him into a front position and the bigs were coming from the baseline hard. It just caught him by surprise, but I'm pretty sure he is going to bounce back in the second game and we will make adjustments."
A lot about the game was surprising. Billed as a slugfest between two heavyweights with elite defenses, this series was, and is, expected to be a low scoring drudge through the mud. For most of Game 1, however, the Spurs were able to keep driving and passing lanes clean, putting on an offensive clinic.
Unburdened with the task of chasing Stephen Curry through a thicket of screens or battling the much larger Harrison Barnes for position in the post, Tony Parker looked refreshed. Parker consistently got into the middle of the defense, collapsing it, finding open shooters and placing teammates in advantageous situations.
Against one of the best defenses in the NBA, the Spurs shot 52.6 percent from the field, 48.3 percent from three (setting a franchise record with 14 made three-pointers), and assisted on 28 of their 40 made field goals.
"It was just one of those games, it happens sometimes," Parker said afterwards. "Our ball movement was great tonight and I shot the ball very well. When we shoot the ball like that we're hard to stop."
No one expects the Spurs to shoot that well from the field again, mostly because few expect a defense like the Grizzlies to yield so many open looks again. After spending six games locking in on one player in Kevin Durant against the Oklahoma City Thunder, it should take some time to adjust. It took two games in the semifinals for the Spurs to adjust from the Los Angeles Lakers post oriented offense to the perimeter oriented Golden State Warriors.
"It is a huge adjustment," Grizzlies point guard Mike Conley admitted. "We are not going to play too many teams like the Spurs who don't just have one guy, but more like 12 guys that can hurt you. They all have high basketball IQ's, they all make plays. They all can dribble-drive and make the three."
The Spurs don't expect to receive that many open shots, nor do they expect to convert at such accurate rates again.
"It's a basketball game, it's not linear all the time," Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said.
The Spurs were quick to dismiss the game as an outlier to what they expect to be a brutally difficult series. What they do expect is to continue to battle in the paint and make the Grizzlies work for every bit of ground they gain there.
If Gasol and Randolph still hold an advantage inside the paint, they do so because of the quality of their work more than a specific weakness in the Spurs. Game 1 was a reminder of how far the Spurs have come in that regard.
If only 30 minutes after Game 1 ended the San Antonio Spurs were ready to put their dominating performance behind them as ancient history, who the hell cares about what happened in 2011? These are two different teams and Game 2 will prove to be a much different game.
AT&T CENTER--Seated in front of the media in the locker room following the San Antonio Spurs 105-83 Game 1 victory over the Memphis Grizzlies, center Tim Duncan was prepared for the question before it was even asked.
"Two years---," the reporter began. As the two syllables left the reporter's mouth, Duncan's head shot back, his eyes rolling in mock disgust.
Two years ago a top-seeded San Antonio Spurs team was upset in the first round by these Memphis Grizzlies. No, that's not entirely accurate. Two years the Spurs were destroyed by the Grizzlies, bullied in the paint by the Marc Gasol-Zach Randolph tandem to such a degree that the Spurs carried the stigma of a soft interior team even as it rectified the problem almost immediately after their 2011 playoff exit.
"Even though it's been two years, when you go through a playoff series with a team, does that better prepare you to face them down the road?" the reporter asked.
"It gives you some experience," Duncan replied. "You know what you're getting into. The personal experience, playing against those guys, helps."
Heading into the Western Conference Finals, the San Antonio Spurs were prepared to answer questions about their rematch with these Grizzlies in more ways than one. Yes, the Grizzlies are a dominant inside team. No, these Spurs aren't the same team that lost in that first round. But perhaps more than any interview response the Spurs could have given, what they came most prepared with was a game plan.
Zach Randolph has been a significant force at times in these playoffs, stopping just short of the brilliant play he offered in 2011 by averaging 18 points and nine rebounds a game during this postseason. On Sunday, the Spurs held Randolph to two points and, even more telling, just eight shot attempts overall.
"They were disrupting my rhythm," Randolph said just moments after apologizing for his performance to teammates in the locker room.
The Spurs threw everything but the kitchen sink at Randolph in Game 1 of the Western Conference Finals, and just in case that didn't suffice, they threw Matt Bonner at him as well. Starting Duncan on Randolph—something that is only made possible by the emergence of Tiago Splitter, who has proven to be able to defend Gasol without constantly requiring a double team—showed the Spurs were intent on stopping Randolph from the start.
Duncan fought Randolph for position. On shot attempts the Spurs brought help, double teaming Randolph on box out attempts. They fronted Randolph, they swarmed, and they brought help before he could even catch the ball.
If the Memphis Grizzlies took advantage of the Spurs lack of size in 2011, the Spurs took advantage of the Memphis' lack of shooting on Sunday. Only one Grizzlies player connected from long range, Quincy Pondexter going 5-9 from behind the three-point line. The Spurs, mindful of their matchups, often left the weak side corner open, defenders completely ignoring Memphis shooters in favor of discouraging entry passes into the post.
"They did a great job of 'storming'," Grizzlies guard Tony Allen said. "They force him into a front position and the bigs were coming from the baseline hard. It just caught him by surprise, but I'm pretty sure he is going to bounce back in the second game and we will make adjustments."
A lot about the game was surprising. Billed as a slugfest between two heavyweights with elite defenses, this series was, and is, expected to be a low scoring drudge through the mud. For most of Game 1, however, the Spurs were able to keep driving and passing lanes clean, putting on an offensive clinic.
Unburdened with the task of chasing Stephen Curry through a thicket of screens or battling the much larger Harrison Barnes for position in the post, Tony Parker looked refreshed. Parker consistently got into the middle of the defense, collapsing it, finding open shooters and placing teammates in advantageous situations.
Against one of the best defenses in the NBA, the Spurs shot 52.6 percent from the field, 48.3 percent from three (setting a franchise record with 14 made three-pointers), and assisted on 28 of their 40 made field goals.
"It was just one of those games, it happens sometimes," Parker said afterwards. "Our ball movement was great tonight and I shot the ball very well. When we shoot the ball like that we're hard to stop."
No one expects the Spurs to shoot that well from the field again, mostly because few expect a defense like the Grizzlies to yield so many open looks again. After spending six games locking in on one player in Kevin Durant against the Oklahoma City Thunder, it should take some time to adjust. It took two games in the semifinals for the Spurs to adjust from the Los Angeles Lakers post oriented offense to the perimeter oriented Golden State Warriors.
"It is a huge adjustment," Grizzlies point guard Mike Conley admitted. "We are not going to play too many teams like the Spurs who don't just have one guy, but more like 12 guys that can hurt you. They all have high basketball IQ's, they all make plays. They all can dribble-drive and make the three."
The Spurs don't expect to receive that many open shots, nor do they expect to convert at such accurate rates again.
"It's a basketball game, it's not linear all the time," Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said.
The Spurs were quick to dismiss the game as an outlier to what they expect to be a brutally difficult series. What they do expect is to continue to battle in the paint and make the Grizzlies work for every bit of ground they gain there.
If Gasol and Randolph still hold an advantage inside the paint, they do so because of the quality of their work more than a specific weakness in the Spurs. Game 1 was a reminder of how far the Spurs have come in that regard.
If only 30 minutes after Game 1 ended the San Antonio Spurs were ready to put their dominating performance behind them as ancient history, who the hell cares about what happened in 2011? These are two different teams and Game 2 will prove to be a much different game.
It was only a momentary letup, just a fraction of a second really. Early in the first quarter Tony Parker chased Stephen Curry around a screen, who launched a three-pointer with the sliver of space afforded him by a late-arriving Danny Green to tie the game at seven apiece.
The San Antonio Spurs called timeout, Parker ripped into Green.
It was a loud statement from Tony Parker, caught on national television. A team like the Golden State Warriors, a player like Curry, they only need the slightest opportunity to create magic. With another trip to the Western Conference Finals on the line and the Memphis Grizzlies waiting, the Spurs needed to keep their playoff edge razor sharp. It was also the last Parker would be heard from for a while.
After connecting on a midrange jumper with a little over eight minutes remaining in the first quarter, Parker's shot would go silent. Over the next 41 minutes of play Parker would miss his next 11 shots, with he and Manu Ginobili exchanging missed jumper after missed jumper.
Having spent the five previous games chasing Curry and Jarrett Jack through a thicket of screens, and fighting a much larger Harrison Barnes in the post, Parker looked worn. While Parker scolded Green, he also trusted and relied on him.
With their 94-82 victory over the Golden State Warriors, the San Antonio Spurs' three stars once again advance to the Western Conference Finals to meet a familiar foe. In 2011 the Memphis Grizzlies upset the top-seeded Spurs in the first round. Those were different teams though, and one need look no further than Thursday night's Game 6 to see why.
Of the three most important players in the Spurs victory over the Warriors, none had their fingerprints on that Memphis series two years ago. Tiago Splitter (14 points on 6-8 shooting) and Danny Green (11 points, three three-pointers) were available then, but rarely used, and a summer away from breaking into the Spurs rotation. Kawhi Leonard (16 points, 10 rebounds), perhaps the Spurs most important player against the Warriors, wasn't even in the NBA.
Yet each were on the floor for the Spurs at the end of the game, coach Gregg Popovich trusting them enough to carry on while franchise foundation Tim Duncan watched from the bench. It was a bold move when Popovich pulled Duncan with 4:28 left in the game, but one that showed how far each of those three have come since even last year's Western Conference Finals. When Duncan left the game the Spurs were grasping onto a two-point lead. When it was over, Green, Leonard, and Splitter had helped extend to 12.
Growing up Danny Green said he used to watch Tim Duncan all the time, describing the opportunity to play alongside Duncan a humbling experience. On Thursday night it was Duncan's turn to watch as Green helped stifled Curry as he had for much of the series.
"I think we have more of a trust now," Green said. "If [Popovich] puts you on the floor, Timmy and Tony are going to trust you and they're going to help you. Me and Kawhi have been with Timmy and Tony the past two years now. We trust each other, and they do a good job of encouraging us and continuing to help us, push us, and help us grow."
Kawhi Leonard has been with the Spurs only a few 10-day contracts less than Green, but he was perhaps the key player in this concluded series. Leonard was the Spurs second-leading rebounder, an efficient source of points, and the key adjustment against the Warriors.
Leonard began the series alternating between Curry, Klay Thompson, and Barnes until Thompson got free for 29-points in the first half of Game 2. From the second half through the rest of the series Leonard was assigned almost exclusively to Thompson, who shot a combined 20-61 from that point on.
"It's been hard," Leonard said of growing into his expanded role. "[The Big Three] already know the game inside and out, and coming in as the new guy on the Spurs, the new face of the Spurs, is a difficult thing.
"But they were patient with me. They just waited until I got better and started learning, being aggressive. I've still got a long ways to go, but I just kept sticking with it, really, just trying to learn each and everyday."
In his time with the Spurs, Tiago Splitter has been a great example of "sticking with it." A heralded important turned afterthought in his 2011 rookie season, Splitter has seen his role expand every season. Last night he ended the game in Duncan's place, with Popovich opting for more mobility on both sides of the ball.
Still recovering from an ankle injury sustained in the first round, Splitter looked more himself, getting off of screens and diving hard to the rim on a pick and roll or for a put back. Surrounding Splitter with four shooters, his cuts to the basket collapsed defenses in pick and roll situations with Ginobili, opening the floor for the Spurs three-point shooters, including Parker.
Late in the fourth quarter with Parker struggling and looking ragged, Popovich sent Cory Joseph—who has had his own meaningful contributions—to the scorer's table. Determined, Parker waved off Popovich's substitution plans, asking that the coach have faith in his ability to finish the game.
With 3:35 remaining and the Warriors cutting the Spurs lead to two, Parker found himself open in the corner courtesy of a vintage Ginobili pass. Without hesitation, or a made basket since the first quarter, Parker calmly hit the three-pointer to give the Spurs some breathing room.
A little more than two minutes later, Ginobili found Parker for another three-pointer, silencing the Warriors once and for all.
It was only a week ago that Golden State Warriors head coach Mark Jackson sat in front of reporters and proclaimed his backcourt to be the best shooting backcourt in the history of the NBA.
That was just before Game 2, and with Stephen Curry coming off a 44-point performance in Game 1 and Klay Thompson about to erupt for a 29-point first half, who could argue with Jackson? Through two games the Warriors appeared to be a revelation—a team capable of generating a high volume of accurate three-pointers at will, even through ill-advised means.
"Call my bluff," challenged Mark Jackson.
San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich is rarely one to gamble; he's lost enough hair leaving that to Manu Ginobili over the years. Instead Popovich called Jackson's hand with his own pair, finding the combination of Kawhi Leonard and Danny Green to be a suitable answer once the rest of the cards on the table are accounted for in the Spurs Game 5 109-91 victory over the Warriors.
Curry and Thompson might be the greatest shooting backcourt in the history of the NBA, but they're not its most dynamic. This is especially true of Klay Thompson, who combines a pure stroke, ideal size and quality defense with underwhelming ball handling and even shakier decision making.
Call my bluff?
Popovich's response was simply to assign Leonard onto Thompson almost exclusively since the first half of Game 2. From that moment on, Thompson has shot a combined 16-49 (32.7 percent) through three-and-a-half games. On Tuesday night, Thompson shot 2-8 and failed to attempt even a single three-pointer. This isn't a random shooting slump; this is Kawhi Leonard's defense settling in against an overmatched player.
"Defensively he was great," Tim Duncan said of Leonard. "His length is just huge for us, and being able to contest from the side and from behind those guys, it just makes them uncomfortable."
The reason the San Antonio Spurs have been able to utilize their best defender on the Warriors secondary scoring threat is because others, most notably Danny Green, have been able to keep Curry's production manageable and his extreme scoring outbursts to just one quarter.
Stephen Curry combines a Godly jump shot, elite ball handling, and quality court vision, but he packages all these things in a very mortal body with very average athleticism relative to his NBA peers. That alone wouldn't level the playing field, except that mortal body also has very frail ankles.
To be fair to Curry, his nine-point, 4-14 shooting performance in Game 5 were obviously due to Curry dragging around a busted ankle, reinjuring it in Game 3. To give Danny Green credit, outside of Curry's Game 1 scoring binge Green has kept him relatively under control once the team's defensive schemes caught up to the unique nuances of their opponents skill sets.
"Each game we've grown more confident in our defense and each other," Green said. "We made the proper adjustments; our bigs have done a great job of helping us with the guards. They're a more perimeter oriented team. With the Lakers, obviously it was more pounding it into the post, so this is a totally different team from the first series and it took us a game or two to adjust."
Between the rearranging their individual defensive assignments, bringing a big an over the screen to force shooters of the three-point line, and funneling the Warriors offense through rookie Harrison Barnes, the Spurs have largely dictated the game to their favor since the second half of Game 2.
Barnes has been game, being the first rookie to collect consecutive 25-point games since Tim Duncan did so in 1998. But in inviting a mismatch with Tony Parker or Gary Neal on Barnes, the Spurs have also instilled some order in a Warriors offense that thrives on chaos.
Yes, the Warriors have the best shooting backcourt in basketball, but in Game 5 it was Green and Leonard making all the noise.
Early in the series Mark Jackson openly spoke of the Warriors hiding Curry on Green in order to provide possessions off and rest. The Spurs have since worked diligently to push Curry through screens, sending Green baseline to baseline and curls. It's not a primary staple of the Spurs offense, but one that utilizes Green's limited skill set and superior size and athleticism over Curry.
For a night, everything Green was gold, with Green shaking free for 16 points on 6-10 shooting and three assists.
"They were running plays to get Danny Green off screens early in the game," Curry said. "A lack of discipline on my end. I think I held my own in the first four games but tonight I wasn't locked in. That is inexcusable. This is a big game. I dropped the ball."
The San Antonio Spurs are now beating the Warriors in all the ways most predicted they would before the series, ruthlessly out-executing them on one end, and chasing shooters off the three-point line on the other.
What has been surprising is that Kawhi Leonard has been the most valuable or important, if not best, all around player in this series.
Before Game 5, Warriors coach Mark Jackson said the hand of God has touched his team, but it's Leonard's gigantic hands that have their fingerprints all over this series.
With the Warriors attack focused on freeing up shooters without the threat of dribble penetration, the Spurs most important defender has shifted from Duncan to Leonard. It was a pair of Leonard steals that created some separation from the Warriors, and a corner three-pointer in the fourth quarter that held the Warriors at bay.
"They've been patient with me," Leonard said of Popovich and Duncan. "They've been waiting for me to get better."
Throughout the series Duncan has been seen communicating with Leonard, who has stepped to the forefront of everything the Spurs are doing defensively this series. The corner three-pointer and the defense invokes memories of Bruce Bowen, who Spurs announcer Sean Elliott once compared to a rash, which is a metaphor Popovich used in describing the Warriors after the game.
"No one talks about getting this thing over with like you've got a rash or that type of thing where if you take a pill or put some cream on it, it's going to be gone," Popovich said. "This is a war. They're a class team. They bust their ass at both ends of the floor and it's not about getting rid of anything, it's about going and playing and that's about it."
The Warriors aren't a rash, and neither is Leonard. But he's been something better than any pill, cream or ointment. He's been the stopper that's plugged all the Spurs leaks. And if Mark Jackson does indeed hold the greatest pair of shooters in the world, the Spurs are still playing the better hand.
From the Memorial Day Miracle to Sunday's Mother's Day Meltdown, Tim Duncan and Gregg Popovich have seen their San Antonio Spurs run through the gamut of playoffs high and lows.
The Game 1 that the Spurs stole was returned in Game 4, and so the series has come full circle as the Spurs and Golden State Warriors enter a best of three series with two of the three games slated for the AT&T Center.
Drawing on their experience, the Spurs will use their time off to gather what has worked through four games and how to proceed moving forward.
So far as adjustments go, Game 5's appear to be fairly simple: square your feet and shoulders to the rim, keep your elbow in, and follow through.
Basketball is a make or miss game, Popovich has liked to remind everyone throughout the season. And if the Spurs wish to make the Western Conference Finals for a second consecutive year, they will have to stop missing so many easy opportunities.
The shooting splits were too ugly for even a mother to love, as the Spurs shot 35.5 percent from the floor, 25.9 percent from three, and 56 percent from the free throw line. In a game that went overtime, the Spurs missed 11 free throws and 20 three-pointers, many of the latter being uncontested.
But the shots were there, the system is working, and the only step left to take is to convert or go home. The adjustments made through the first three games appear to be paying off, and the nightmare matchups introduced in the first two games appear to at least be manageable.
Chief among those adjustments has been designating Kawhi Leonard to Klay Thompson on a nearly full-time basis.
The Spurs have history dealing with an impossible point guard and an elite shooting wing dating all the way back t o 2008. Then Popovich ceded the Spurs matchup up with New Orleans point guard Chris Paul and placed his best perimeter defender, Bruce Bowen, on Peja Stojakovic.
Thompson struggled in Game 4, going 5-13, and more notably, without connecting on a single three-pointer while only finding room to launch two. And with the exception of a third quarter from Stephen Curry and a second quarter from Thompson, the Warriors offense has been manageable this series.
On a sprained ankle Curry managed to get free for five three-pointers, mostly because Curry is a special player capable of making unfathomable plays. But with Splitter back in the mix and the Spurs frontline rotations back to normal, the team has been able to stretch their hedges out above the three-point line with another big man on the backline, keeping their defense from breaking.
The lone exploitable matchup left to the Warriors is the one the Spurs have ceded to them as the least potent of all poisons. Harrison Barnes was the Warriors' leading scored in Game 4, but his 26 points came on an inefficient 26 shots.
With the Warriors relying heavily on Jarrett Jack as the primary playmaker in light of Curry's ankle troubles, the Spurs are switching all point guard-small forward pick and rolls, all but forcing the Warriors to throw the ball to Barnes in the mid-post with Gary Neal or Tony Parker defending.
From that spot on the floor the Spurs can shade defensive help without completely distorting the shape of their defense. While Barnes can get a shot over Neal or Parker at his discretion, he does so from the long two-point range the Spurs generally give up in their pick and roll coverage anyways.
These teams know who each other are now, and that generally leads to an incredible playoff showcase. The matchups have been dictated and accounted for and the winner will likely be the one who can best assert their will through them.
With all hands being played, this series boils down to a make or miss game.
In the NBA playoffs, the bigger stage offered to every game often leads to bigger reactions, and too often perspective is easily lost.
The San Antonio Spurs and the Golden State Warriors resume their series tonight in Oakland, and though the series stands tied at one victory each, the Spurs appear to be in a hole far deeper.
Only two late game collapses have kept the Warriors from appearing invincible in this series. At the same time some are waiting for some sort of regression to the mean. And somewhere in between lays the truth to what this series really is.
Save for one explosive third quarter from Stephen Curry in Game 1, and an otherworldly first half from Klay Thompson in Game 2, the Warriors haven't deviated too far from their base percentages. The Warriors led the league in three-point percentage and they did so from a fair amount of attempts. To some extent, this is who they are.
One can expect that Curry doesn't have many 22-point quarters in him, not because he's incapable, but because those are rare occurrences. And it's difficult for any player to shoot 8-9 from the three-point line in even ideal circumstances, especially while defending the other team's best player on the other end.
The Spurs would be best served to respect the potential of Curry and Thompson while not overreacting to the threat they pose. There are adjustments to be made, but straying too far from the team concepts that have been built all season can be disastrous as well. With that in mind, some thoughts on potential adjustments for Game 3:
Who starts next to Duncan?
In Game 1, with Splitter unavailable, the Spurs turned to Boris Diaw. In Game 2, Matt Bonner got the nod. Diaw made some huge contributions down the stretch of the Spurs victory, but most of his best work was done with Tim Duncan off the floor in small lineups. In fact, most of the Spurs best lineups these first two games have been with just one true big man on the floor.
Unless he's still under some sort of heavy minutes restriction related to his ankle injury, it might be best to start Tiago Splitter.
Part of the Spurs resurgence on the defensive end this season has been their commitment to the Duncan-Splitter pairing and the length that provides them on the court. The Warriors are an unorthodox offense, however, and there is some concern that might leave Splitter vulnerable.
The two big man alignments are designed to discourage dribble penetration, and against most teams this is true. But the Warriors don't play a traditional drive and kick game. Instead, their primary two creators—Curry and Thompson—use the threat of their shot to open passing or diving lanes for cutters.
Splitter wouldn't be able to affect that, but where he would help is in shading over towards Parker when the he is guarding Harrison Barnes in the post, discouraging interior passes, and providing another lengthy defender on the interior when the Warriors drag Duncan out top above the three-point line.
The underrated change, however, might be to the Spurs offense. Tiago Splitter is perhaps the Spurs best big man in pick and roll situations. He has a good sense of timing and space, finishes well around the rim, and perhaps most importantly, gets of his screens quicker than Duncan can.
That last part might not seem like much, but it's an extra second or two less that the defense has in deciding between slowing Parker or cutting off Splitter.
Duncan still remains an important release valve, popping out to the elbows where most of the Spurs pick and rolls have ended with him anyways. With Parker bottled up, sometimes the threat of Splitter's dives act as dribble penetration itself, collapsing defenses and opening up three-point shooters.
What to do with Tony Parker defensively?
Ideally Parker would remain with Curry in the Spurs base defense, and for most of the season the Spurs have thrived with Parker executing the team's defensive concepts and pushing the ball handler to help.
But times aren't always ideal and unlike every other point guard in the NBA, Curry isn't looking for dribble penetration so much as he's just looking for space to launch his shot. Still, keeping Parker on Curry keeps the Spurs in their familiar rotations so long as Curry is manageable, which for him is still very good, but not the 22-point outburst he had in the third quarter.
Obviously, the Spurs will have to offer different looks regardless, and in these situations against the Warriors starting lineups, moving Parker to Harrison Barnes might represent the lesser of evils. Either Thompsons or Barnes will move immediately to the post, but Thompson's posts remain further out where he can shoot over the top while Barnes tends to move straight to the block.
Neither situation is ideal obviously, but digging in on the post and sending a double team to the rim are more natural for a defense and skews their rotation less.
When does Manu Ginobili start?
For a decade Spurs coach Gregg Popovich's trump card in the playoffs has been to change Ginobili's status in the starting lineup. So seeing him alongside Parker at the opening tip is likely a question of when more than if.
Danny Green had a poor shooting night in Game 2, as did everyone, but he hasn't suffered the same collapse he had in last year's Western Conference Finals by any means.
At this point it's painful to notice the step Ginobili has lost, especially on the defensive end, and in that respect Green is the better defender at this point.
But Curry and Thompson are able to log heavy minutes together, and part of that reason is, according to Mark Jackson, Curry is free to take possessions off on the defensive end when guarding Green, Gary Neal, or any of the Spurs other spot-up shooters.
Right now Mark Jackson is "outcoaching" Popovich simply because his roster makeup allows him to dictate matchups from the opening tip. There haven't been a lot of major decisions forced on a coach whose in-game adjustments remain questionable, and making him decide where to place Curry defensively with the Spurs most dynamic threats on the floor is a fantastic way to test that.
AT&T CENTER—The San Antonio Spurs head to Oakland and Oracle Arena in the same position as every other team still in the playoffs, tied at 1-1 in their best-of-seven series. But perhaps only the injury riddled Chicago Bulls have a more tenuous grasp on their playoff hopes.
Through two games the NBA's most intricate and vaunted system—one based on heavy motion designed to create opening on offense, and a bend-but-don't-break defense built to concede the most inefficient shots—is being worked by what appears to be a superiorly talented team.
To jump straight to the bottom line, Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson are far and away the best two players in this series right now. Should that tend continue to hold up, it's over for the Spurs.
"Offensively, I've said I've got the greatest shooting backcourt that's ever played the game," Golden State Warriors coach Mark Jackson said. "Call my bluff."
Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich and Tim Duncan have perhaps two of the best poker faces in the world, and even they can see that Jackson isn't bluffing when he's representing pocket aces.
A game after somehow surviving a 44-point barrage from Stephen Curry, the Spurs fell to Klay Thompson's career-high 34 points, 24 of which came on 8-of-9 shooting from the three-point line. Twenty-nine of those points were scored in the first half, a feat Jackson called on the historic halves in NBA history.
And still Popovich has no answer for Jackson's bluff.
"I thought it was polite of [Curry and Thompson] to at least take turns and not both be on fire on the same night," Popovich said after the game. "Maybe the next iteration is that neither of them will be hot in Game 3, that's what I'm hoping."
To an extent that's what the Spurs are relying on, a regression to the Warriors mean, and perhaps a progression to their own. Thompson and Curry have produced historical performances, and historical performances tend to be such because how scarce they are.
And if one is to put faith in historic trends, the San Antonio Spurs figure to shoot better than the roughly 24 percent they shot from the three-point line, many of which were open, and capitalize on the eight free throws the team missed.
Correct either one of those outliers and perhaps the Spurs even take Game 2.
But even if the shooting trends prove unsustainable, the matchup problems that have surfaced in this series are very real and will continue to be a major problem going forward through the rest of this series for the Spurs.
Tony Parker had been solid defensively through the season, and he had been so simply by executing the Spurs defensive schemes. At different times throughout the season the Spurs have shut down the likes of Chris Paul and Kyrie Irving, and they've done it with Parker as the primary defender for large stretches.
But Curry isn't either one of them, and it's telling when you see him casually dropping in three-pointers from the top of the key, off of one leg! That's a patented Steve Nash shot, only with infinitely more range.
Again, Parker's defense relies on funneling point guards to the proper help spots, and generally he performs this task adequately. But Curry's range stretches defenses beyond breaking points and ultimately leaves defenders on an island. When that happens it helps to have size to compensate, which is why the Spurs try to cross match.
The problem is doing so leaves Parker to deal with the 6-7 Thompson or 6-8 Harrison Barnes, and the manner in which the Warriors have singled out Parker borders on abuse.
"I'm a big believer in if there's a matchup out there that you can take advantage of, then that's as good an offense as you can find," Jackson said before the game. He then went on to describe a sequence from Game 1 that could just as easily be applied to Game 2. "We had a direct post to [Barnes] on Tony Parker, they double team, Draymond [Green] flashes to the foul line, then drops it down to Bogut for the dunk."
"You can't draw up a better play," Jackson added. "We don't have anything in our repertoire better than that. To me it's reading and making plays and adjusting to the defense."
Again, Mark Jackson is on point as he has been for most of the series. The Warriors are dictating matchups, and in doing so have simplified the game in a way that even the most sophisticated schemes cannot account for.
The Spurs will make adjustments, and starting Manu Ginobili always seems to be a favorite one to look out for. But for the Spurs to retake momentum in this series, the Spurs best players have to reclaim the edge in their matchups.
Because if this is who Curry and Thompson are, and more importantly, if this is who Parker and Ginobili are, this series won't end like anybody expected.
The San Antonio Spurs head to Oakland and Oracle Arena in the same position as every other team still in the playoffs, tied at 1-1 in their best-of-seven series. But perhaps only the injury riddled Chicago Bulls have a more tenuous grasp on their playoff hopes.
Through two games the NBA's most intricate and vaunted system—one based on heavy motion designed to create opening on offense, and a bend-but-don't-break defense built to concede the most inefficient shots—is being worked by what appears to be a superiorly talented team.
To jump straight to the bottom line, Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson are far and away the best two players in this series right now. Should that tend continue to hold up, it's over for the Spurs.
"Offensively, I've said I've got the greatest shooting backcourt that's ever played the game," Golden State Warriors coach Mark Jackson said. "Call my bluff."
Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich and Tim Duncan have perhaps two of the best poker faces in the world, and even they can see that Jackson isn't bluffing when he's representing pocket aces.
A game after somehow surviving a 44-point barrage from Stephen Curry, the Spurs fell to Klay Thompson's career-high 34 points, 24 of which came on 8-of-9 shooting from the three-point line. Twenty-nine of those points were scored in the first half, a feat Jackson called on the historic halves in NBA history.
And still Popovich has no answer for Jackson's bluff.
"I thought it was polite of [Curry and Thompson] to at least take turns and not both be on fire on the same night," Popovich said after the game. "Maybe the next iteration is that neither of them will be hot in Game 3, that's what I'm hoping."
To an extent that's what the Spurs are relying on, a regression to the Warriors mean, and perhaps a progression to their own. Thompson and Curry have produced historical performances, and historical performances tend to be such because how scarce they are.
And if one is to put faith in historic trends, the San Antonio Spurs figure to shoot better than the roughly 24 percent they shot from the three-point line, many of which were open, and capitalize on the eight free throws the team missed.
Correct either one of those outliers and perhaps the Spurs even take Game 2.
But even if the shooting trends prove unsustainable, the matchup problems that have surfaced in this series are very real and will continue to be a major problem going forward through the rest of this series for the Spurs.
Tony Parker had been solid defensively through the season, and he had been so simply by executing the Spurs defensive schemes. At different times throughout the season the Spurs have shut down the likes of Chris Paul and Kyrie Irving, and they've done it with Parker as the primary defender for large stretches.
But Curry isn't either one of them, and it's telling when you see him casually dropping in three-pointers from the top of the key, off of one leg! That's a patented Steve Nash shot, only with infinitely more range.
Again, Parker's defense relies on funneling point guards to the proper help spots, and generally he performs this task adequately. But Curry's range stretches defenses beyond breaking points and ultimately leaves defenders on an island. When that happens it helps to have size to compensate, which is why the Spurs try to cross match.
The problem is doing so leaves Parker to deal with the 6-7 Thompson or 6-8 Harrison Barnes, and the manner in which the Warriors have singled out Parker borders on abuse.
"I'm a big believer in if there's a matchup out there that you can take advantage of, then that's as good an offense as you can find," Jackson said before the game. He then went on to describe a sequence from Game 1 that could just as easily be applied to Game 2. "We had a direct post to [Barnes] on Tony Parker, they double team, Draymond [Green] flashes to the foul line, then drops it down to Bogut for the dunk."
"You can't draw up a better play," Jackson added. "We don't have anything in our repertoire better than that. To me it's reading and making plays and adjusting to the defense."
Again, Mark Jackson is on point as he has been for most of the series. The Warriors are dictating matchups, and in doing so have simplified the game in a way that even the most sophisticated schemes cannot account for.
The Spurs will make adjustments, and starting Manu Ginobili always seems to be a favorite one to look out for. But for the Spurs to retake momentum in this series, the Spurs best players have to reclaim the edge in their matchups.
Because if this is who Curry and Thompson are, and more importantly, if this is who Parker and Ginobili are, this series won't end like anybody expected.
In the midst of his first playoff run, and a brilliant one at that, the Golden State Warriors Stephen Curry has emerged as one of the most uniquely potent threats in the NBA.
Among all NBA players, perhaps only Kevin Durant can access such a dangerously accurate shot in such a variety of ways. Coming off screens, in transition, spotting up for catch and shoot three-pointers, and even dangerous off the dribble in isolation, the moment either player crosses half court the defense must mark them as a threat to shoot, regardless of the situation.
While Curry lacks the length and athleticism of Durant, he compensates with elite ball handling and premium court vision and passing. He also possesses one very important advantage that Durant currently lacks, one that could make a difference in his series against the Spurs: the Warriors protect Stephen Curry as much as they rely on him.
In baseball, quality teams protect cleanup hitters by surrounding them in the lineup with similar players. This is done to prevent pitchers from dictating the matchups they want whenever possible. In Klay Thompson and Harrison Barnes, the Warriors have two quality options that force opposing defenses to "pitch to Curry" so to speak.
In the modern NBA, the point guard position has become the hardest position to defend. With an emphasis on removing physical contact on the perimeter it has become increasingly difficult to keep point guards out of the paint without, at the very least, an extra defender shading a step or two towards the paint to discourage dribble penetration.
Curry takes advantage of the hand-checking rules in a different manner. An elite shooter, even off the dribble, Curry needs only a little bit of space to produce a high percentage shot. Combine that threat with his ball handling, and it's extremely difficult for most point guards to defend.
In the modern NBA the best way to reduce the damage of a point guard, strictly from a matchup point of view, is to cross match with a quick, lengthy defender.
The theory is sound. A lengthy, quick defender can back off a point guard's dribble, buying time to recover from their first step or quick change of direction, while still contesting the shot.
It is a strategy that has been used with varying degrees of success against the Spurs and Tony Parker, and one that the Warriors are employing by moving Klay Thompson over to guard Parker. The aim isn't necessarily to shut the opposing point guard down, but to skew percentages and efficiency enough that a team doesn't have to commit and collapse their entire defense.
Teams have gotten away with this tactic in recent years due to multiple injuries to Ginobili, and players like Danny Green or George Hill not having enough savvy off the dribble or in the post to consistently punish the weaker defender.
In Thompson and Barnes, the Warriors have two quality threats with enough size, athleticism, and shooting ability to overwhelm an opposing point guard should one be defending them.
When the Spurs tried to move Danny Green or Kawhi Leonard over to guard Curry at different times, the Warriors immediately posted Thompson, who simply shot over the top of Parker with little duress.
Klay Thompson is the key to it all in that he is capable of taking on the more difficult backcourt assignment while punishing teams that try to do the same. In this sense the Mark Jackson and the Golden State Warriors are able to dictate the matchups they want to some degree.
It sounds simple to say just put Leonard on Curry, but there are ramifications to that.
There is a reason the Spurs biggest run came when Thompson fouled out. There's a reason Tony Parker shot 4-15 before Thompson fouled out and 7-11 after. For Game 1 there is only one player that posted a positive +/- every stint he played, and that's Thompson.
With Thompson and Barnes next to Curry, it becomes difficult to move better defenders over to Curry. When Jarrett Jack enters the game, that dynamic changes.
Ideally the Spurs would remain in their base defense with their base personnel and hope that Curry doesn't simply go off on them. Throughout the season the team has been able to approach all elite point guards in this manner while still retaining a top five defense.
But it's foolish to say allow a red hot Curry to get his while containing everyone else because he is absolutely a player that can efficiently score 20-plus points in a quarter and in most cases that will be enough to beat you.
There are contingency options for such occasions.
A simple one would be to fight fire-with-fire by giving more minutes to Parker-Ginobili lineup combinations, forcing Curry to work defensively and creating multiple advantages for the Spurs in transition, where cross matching can actually backfire on a team.
Another is to move Parker to Barnes. The obvious response would be to move Barnes to the low post to exploit, but the Spurs have had similar success in the past (for example, Brent Barry guarding Rashard Lewis while the latter was still a post-up threat in Seattle). It's certainly easier to provide help to the low block than it is above the three-point line, and the Warriors taking advantage of that matchup would also mean keeping the ball out of the hands of their top two options.
No option is ideal, but then, the playoffs aren't about ideal situations. They are about who can dictate matchups and who can adapt to them. A significant part of the Spurs victory wasn't about adjusting; it was simply about six fouls ceasing it from existing.
The NBA playoffs are nothing if not a string of moments tied together in a grander narrative. The stakes and smaller sample sizes skewed by the short time span of a seven-game series elevating every moment.
Players use this stage to launch their legacies, most famously Michael Jordan, who in a loss to the Celtics prompted Larry Bird to exclaim he was "God disguised as Michael Jordan."
Unfortunately for Stephen Curry, the San Antonio Spurs are nowhere near as good a quote as Bird was. The best description for the 44-point performance Curry unleashed was actually produced weeks ago, before Game 2 of the Spurs first round series against the Los Angeles Lakers.
Then, Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich likened watching Curry to watching Jordan. Not a straight up comparison, mind you, as Popovich had to reiterate that his comments were not meant to directly compare the two. Popovich merely stated watching Curry shoot is like watching Jordan play in that one can get lost and mesmerized by the performance.
"It's like when you used to watch Michael, I was watching Curry make shots I couldn't believe," Popovich said. "When you get close to the playoffs, and in the playoffs, you see these types of performances and they're always memorable for all of us, coaches, fans, players."
Curry isn't Jordan, obviously. For one, he doesn't carry the same God-like presence or abilities. Sitting just a few feet away from Curry in the postgame interview room, he appears to be more of a regular guy than perhaps any other player in the NBA. Nothing from his appearance screams NBA player until you watch him go into his shooting motion.
But NBA players know game when they see it, and Curry has gathered a following of NBA superstars going back to his college days. On Monday night those players, and the rest of the basketball viewing world, could do little to hide their excitement on Twitter as Curry launched jumper after jumper in the third quarter.
Nothing about his 22-point quarter was rational, as Mark Jackson and the Warriors abandoned all semblance of an offense while Curry simply had his way with whatever defense the Spurs tried to throw at him.
"It was a crazy game," Tony Parker said afterwards, his mood somewhere between relieved and exhausted. "Curry was making crazy shots. We just tried to hang on."
The game was a roller coaster, and through most of it the Spurs appeared to merely be along for Curry's ride.
But like the Bird's Celtics when confronted with individual superiority, these Spurs are already established, their reputations cemented, and their sense of the moment impeccable.
The Spurs kept faith in both program and process, chipping away at the Warriors lead in the event that Curry's ability to warp reality ended, and when the Warriors faltered the Spurs capitalized in the form of an 18-2 run to improbably send the game into overtime.
There are some tactical adjustments to be made. While Curry's extravagant performance screamed outlier, it's one that's entirely replicable. The Spurs must still account for Klay Thompson, whose length, quickness, and shooting ability made life hell for Parker on both ends for much of the game.
Thompson's ability to lock and trail Parker, cutting off ideal angles, allowed the Warriors' defense to stay at home on their assignments. On the other end, his height and shooting ability made it difficult to cross match defenders onto a scorching Curry, as every time the Spurs sent Green or Kawhi Leonard to Curry, the Warriors simply attacked Parker in the post.
It's no coincidence then that the bulk of the Spurs run occurred when Thompson fouled out, freeing Parker to dominate the offense and Kawhi Leonard and the Spurs defense to focus solely on Curry.
"We just wanted to keep playing and competing," Popovich said. "Try to make stops and try to make adjustments both personnel wise and defensively try to get more stops and stay in attack mode on offense."
The Spurs found themselves back in the game because they got back to trusting their process. They weathered Curry's storm and worked for open shots. Boris Diaw, stepping up in place of a flu-stricken Tim Duncan, spaced the floor, set screens to free shooters, and played quality defense.
Danny Green, the Spurs saving grace on offense all night, worked against the vision of Curry and other defenders to find room for his shot, including the three-pointer that sent the game into overtime.
And the Spurs won it because they had a player in Manu Ginobili not afraid of seizing his own moment. Ginobili proclaimed as much during the first round series against the Lakers.
While his willingness to inject himself into the storyline has been responsible for things like fouling Dirk Nowitzki at the rim with the Spurs up three in a pivotal playoff game, not to mention more than one ill advised shot attempt, it's also why he's able to shrug off a woeful shooting night to hit a game-winner.
"I went from trading him on the spot to wanting to cook him breakfast tomorrow," Popovich said of Ginobili's consecutive three-point attempts, the first of which was an ill-advised shot with time remaining that allowed the Warriors a fast break layup to take the lead. "When I talk to him and say, 'Manu,' he goes 'this is what I do."
The game was Curry's arrival, but it was Ginobili's moment. And the Spurs and Warriors still have at the very least three more games—but likely more—to fill what appears to be a compelling narrative.
Texan Brooks Reed and former Texan JJ Moses were hanging out with 1250 ESPN San Antonio fans at Buffalo Wild Wings during the second and third rounds of the NFL draft.
Mike and Mike 
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