The Spurs Hold On To Prevent The Sweep
It’s not over yet! Ok it may be mostly over, but the Spurs are not going out without a fight. I can respect that. They had every reason to just head into this game, go through the motions, and get a head start on their summer vacation. I don’t think with everything going on anyone would have complained. But that isn’t who the Spurs are, and behind a great night from LaMarcus Aldridge who had 22/10, and a vintage Manu performance off the bench with 16 points, the Spurs beat the Warriors at their own game. It may surprise you that it was SA that made 15 3PM compared to just 7 for GS, and that it was SA with the 45/53% splits as opposed to the 28/25% for GS. It was SA that finished with just 8 TOs compared to the 18 for GS, and seeing as how those resulted in 21 Spurs points, I’d say that was pretty important.
The Spurs got off to a good start, leading by 14 at the break and things for the most part were never in doubt. A strong closing quarter kept the Warriors to their lowest point total of any quarter, and the late game execution from SA looked about as good as you could want. Seeing Manu be the guy to drop the dagger made things even sweeter. What’s surprising is that none of the three games have been all that close for the team that won. No single digit wins in any of the four games this series, that is certainly not something I expected coming in.
You could say the Spurs got a bit lucky, that they just caught the Warriors on an off shooting night, and you’d probably be right. The Spurs did get killed 61-34 on the glass, and did also give up 24 OREB. I’m not sure I’ve seen a team win by double digits while giving up that many offensive rebounds. It certainly helps when you get 40 points from your bench where every guy who played more than 1 minute shot at least 50% from the field. If SA is able to get that kind of showing from their role players on the road, I could see giving them a punchers chance in Game 5.
The happiest of all the teams is probably HOU right now. I can only imagine they want this series to go as long as possible, and seeing as how they blew their chance at a sweep the night before, it was probably a relief to see GS do the same today.
P.S.
Manu forever