Tonight’s dispiriting loss to the Mavs was a game of back and forth runs. Unfortunately, they made theirs last and they made it last, outscoring us 42-23 in the dismal 4th quarter. Everything positive that we had seemingly built over 3 quarters was destroyed in a flurry of Nowitzki fade aways and back-breaking 3s from Kidd and Terry. While they heated up, we cooled down, settling for (missed) jump shots rather than attacking the basket. We finally got some offense going in the end, but it was too late. Our defense could never get the stops necessary to let us back into the game. In the end, the better team won tonight, and our futility against teams of quality continued unabated.
The days of us owing the Mavs are long gone. I know this seems like a silly thing to say because it’s so obvious. But I don’t think it’s really dawned on most Spurs fans until this year. Even heading into our first round match-up last year, so many of us thought we’d win the series simply because we were the Spurs, they were the Mavs, and that’s just how it was going to work. When they did win, it was because we were a broken team running on one and a half good wheels and almost no gas.
But it’s hard to ignore the obvious truth staring us in the face: the Mavs are a better team than us. We got really good games out of all four of our supposed stars. Duncan was his usual brilliant self. Tony was playing like the Tony of last year, driving and spinning to the basket and draining his jump shot. Manu was vintage, a whirling dervish doing everything necessary to win. And Richard Jefferson played superb D on Dirk (holding him to 3 for 16 shooting through 3 quarters) and had a pretty good offensive night. I don’t know what more we could have asked for from them. Our bench got outplayed by theirs, and we didn’t have any other role player step up. But when we get good games from our 4 best players, we should win, shouldn’t we?
I also don’t understand what happened to our defense in the 4th quarter. Through three quarters we played good if not spectacular defense, bottling up Dirk, contesting most shots, and not letting them really get anything easy at the rim. Yes, we gave up way too many offensive boards and 2nd chance points, and we sent them to the line too easily (I don’t like to engage in ref-blaming, so I’ll just leave it at that). But they were mostly held in check, and we had a 10 point lead going into the fourth.
But everything changed in the 4th. All of a sudden we were switching on every pick, and we ended up with disastrous mismatches that greatly favored the Mavs. Duncan ended up on Terry numerous times which, despite great effort from Duncan, is usually going to end badly for the Spurs. Also, Dirk often found himself with much shorter players on him, allowing him to easily shoot over the top without any pressure. Once he found his rhythm, it was game over. I don’t understand why we were switching everything, and why our defense suddenly fell apart in the 4th quarter. Is this the defense that we wanted to play?
Our offense also fell apart in the last frame. We either got complacent, lazy, tired, or all three. Over the first 6 minutes of the quarter, we stopped attacking the rim, settling for quick jump shots that weren’t necessarily good shots. We stopped moving the ball and doing all of the things that had allowed us to build the lead. In the blink of an eye, the lead had evaporated, we were back in a tight ballgame, and all semblance of “Spurs Basketball” had disappeared.
Which gets us back to our original point: the Mavs are the better team, probably the second best team in the West right now. We are unable to compete with them or any other elite team right now. We are pretenders to the throne, and until we can prove otherwise, should not be considered a viable threat to do anything of substance in the playoffs.
The good news? There’s a lot of basketball left to be played, and anything can happen. Or so we hope.
Our next chance to prove something is Tuesday, when the Lakers come to town. Before that we play the lowly Nets on Sunday, a classic trap game. Luckily for us, we win the games we should.
Now if we could only win some of the other ones.
