In the fourth installment of 3 in the Key™, Andrew Flores and Trace Ronning discuss the 28th game of the season, the Spurs 102-100 win on the road against the Houston Rockets.
Let’s start with Andrew’s three key takeaways…
When the Spurs trail by 13 points with only 4:39 left in a game against one of the highest scoring teams in the league, you can easy slip into thinking that there will be another notch in the L-column. What the Spurs did against Houston late in contest three of four this season is the subject of my three takeaways:
1. The Spurs are prepared to beat a team from behind the three point line
What made the outcome of this game even sweeter was that it was against a team which can obnoxiously beat you with shooting from beyond the arc. Manu has been fantastically reliable and Patty could be our new Captain Clutch this season, but it is the team’s increase in consistency LATE IN THE GAME, Green hitting his “Tar-Heed Triple,” which makes the three point attack effective when a sprint to the finish line is needed.
2. The Spurs have a lot of work to do
This game was almost a dud as the “yips” – the team’s high turnover numbers this season – started to creep up during the comeback. This isn’t the only game in which turnovers have made a late game more interesting than Spurs fan would typically want. Fortunately, the maturity of our leadership kept the panic meter low. Still, turnovers are a weakness that needs to be addressed if the Spurs want to beat the league’s top tier teams.
3. If facing the Rockets in the playoffs is inevitable…
… it could be a nail-biter of a series. Every match this season has been close, with victory margins of 2, 6 and 2. Fortunately, the Spurs have shown grit in winning away from home, which syncs with the team’s philosophy of how to win championships. I hope that the days of losing in San Antonio are just an awkward period, a new team figuring out its chemistry. Hopefully the #21 jersey now hanging from the rafters will give this team confidence, as if that jersey were still running the floor.
Now let’s kick it to Trace. What were your three key takeaways from the game?
It’s always a good night when the Rockets lose and the Spurs win.
And it’s an even better night when the Spurs beat the Rockets. It’s three times as good when the Spurs beat the Rockets by erasing a double digit lead in the waning minutes of the game.
What I’m saying is that December 20th was a good night, even though San Antonio allowed an opposing player to score 30 points for the first time in 25 games and Manu Ginobili missed a pair of game-clinching free throws with less than three seconds on the clock.
Here are my three key takeaways from the Spurs’ win:
1. Patty Mills is for real
I don’t think he’s supplanting Tony Parker as the starter anytime soon, but Mills and Parker both played 24 minutes against the Rockets. Patty seems more and more comfortable leading the team, each time he goes out on the court, and he’s a much more positive asset on defense than the elder Parker. The fact that Patty drilled a fearless, game-winning three has to improve his stock with Pop, too.
2. San Antonio has to do better in the paint
It’s hard to stop James Harden from scoring in the paint and getting to the free throw line, but getting outscored 50-30 in the paint is a problem. So is giving up 20 offensive rebounds to guys like Nene, who I honestly didn’t know was still playing basketball. That’s just far too many opportunities for second chance shots, especially against a team that usually moves the ball and shoots the three well.
3. Kawhi needs to keep getting to the foul line
Kawhi Leonard shot 13 free throws against Houston. That’s three more than Harden! Which is really saying something. If Leonard can keep this up, it’s going to help out the team tremendously down the stretch. Kawhi didn’t have a great shooting night (5-15 FGs, 0-3 from deep) but if he can keep finding a way to score 20+ points by getting to the line, the Spurs are going to be competitive in every contest this season.
