Mavs Take Their Turn

Game 13 vs. Dallas: Mavericks 95, Spurs 92
Record: 10-3 Streak: L-1

I spent the day after Thanksgiving hooking up a TiVo dual tuner for my sister-in-law and her husband — an early Christmas gift from my wife and I — and eagerly anticipating Game 13 in the epic Spurs-Mavericks series that began last November.

The Spurs and Mavs played to a 2-2 draw during the 2005-2006 regular season, then went down to the wire in their 7-game playoff series, with three games decided by a bucket or less. The Spurs won earlier this month, tying the series at six games a piece, so I guess I should have expected that the Mavericks would take their turn to win this one. But the game was at home, so I was optimistic. That changed about two minutes into the first quarter. By quarter’s end, the Spurs were down by 14 and I was looking for someplace to hide.

The Spurs made it interesting, taking the lead briefly in the the third, despite more lousy freethrow shooting from Tim Duncan. (I wasn’t surprised when Tim made all three shots after drawing a foul from behind the arc with just 12 seconds left, but he was 6-for-12 before that.)

There was faint praise from Pop about the team’s play.

“They did a great job for 48 minutes. We did a great job for a half.”

Fabricio Oberto, who Popovich called the Spurs’ “most consistent player,” had 14. Manu Ginobili did not play in the fourth quarter, and the Spurs said that he had a lower back contusion.

This time last year, the Spurs were also 10-3. Good news. Even better news, this year all three losses have been at home. That trend won’t hold up. Overall, it was a disappointing loss to the team we’re almost certain to face in the Western Finals this year, but not all bad. At least the TiVo I installed didn’t turn all the players blue.