alamo50
05-17-2005, 12:44 PM
Published: Tuesday, May 17, 2005
Seattle heads back to San Antonio needing at the very least one win on the Spurs' home court.
By Rich Myhre
Herald Writer
Two wins at KeyArena, including Sunday night's 101-89 blowout of the San Antonio Spurs, did plenty for team confidence and morale. But the task is still tall for the Seattle SuperSonics, beginning with tonight's Game 5 at San Antonio's SBC Center.
A week, ago, the Spurs opened this series with convincing home victories - 103-81 on May 8 and 108-91 on May 10. They have, in fact, lost just four games at the SBC Center this entire season, dropping a mere three in the regular season and losing their playoff opener to Denver on April 24.
Which is why the Sonics know they must carry over every bit of the momentum from Sunday's lopsided win into tonight's contest.
"That same performance has to be put on the floor in San Antonio," said Seattle guard Ray Allen, who led Sunday's rout with 32 points. "And that's not that easy, playing in somebody else's building."
Added teammate Antonio Daniels, "In those first two games (in San Antonio) they took care of home. Now we've done the same thing they did. We took care of home. But to go down there again, we need to refocus ourselves."
Just as KeyArena was rocking from the noise of a spirited sellout crowd for Games 3 and 4, so will Spurs fans make plenty of ruckus for their ballclub tonight. Though NBA players become accustomed to hostile road venues, the din can sometimes have a smothering effect.
"Whenever you play on the road," Allen said, "what you worry about the most is loud noise when something goes wrong and you hang your heads. We just have to stay together as a team and not worry about what's going on in that building and what their fans are doing.
"We've got to beat this team," he said. "We're playing against the whole arena, but we've got to beat those five guys out on the floor. And to do that we've just got to stay together. When things go bad, we've just got to find a positive way."
It would be easy to think the Sonics have San Antonio's number, based on the ease with which they won on Sunday. Though the final margin was 12 points, Seattle led by 20 in the fourth quarter and Spurs center Tim Duncan spent most of the period on the bench, an indication that coach Gregg Popovich was waving the white flag.
Still, almost every NBA playoff series has its ebbs and flows, some of them dramatic. In the other Western Conference semifinal series, Phoenix routed Dallas in the opener, then lost Game 2 to the Mavericks. The teams traded one-sided wins in Games 3 and 4, leaving that series knotted 2-2.
Likewise, Detroit spanked Indiana in that opener, then was handled by the Pacers in Game 2. Again, the teams split the next two games, making that series also 2-2.
Which is why many of the Sonics were quick to caution against overconfidence in the wake of their back-to-back victories.
"We have a lot more confidence now than we did when we came home from San Antonio at 0-2," said forward Nick Collison. "I know we feel a lot better about ourselves on this team. But still, I don't think there's going to be much carryover on their side for the next game and I don't think there will be on ours either.
"I don't think the games carry over that much from one to the next," he went on. "You still have to come out and try to win each one. That's why you see these swings. Like in the Indiana-Detroit series, Indiana kills them in one game and Detroit kills them in the next. So it really doesn't seem to matter. Each game is a new game."
The bottom line, he added, "is that we still have to get a win in San Antonio."
No more tix for Game 6: Playoff tickets for the Sonics' showdown with the San Antonio Spurs in Game 6 of their Western Conference semifinal series sold out on Monday. The game will air locally on Fox Sports Net (cable) and on ESPN (cable).
Seattle heads back to San Antonio needing at the very least one win on the Spurs' home court.
By Rich Myhre
Herald Writer
Two wins at KeyArena, including Sunday night's 101-89 blowout of the San Antonio Spurs, did plenty for team confidence and morale. But the task is still tall for the Seattle SuperSonics, beginning with tonight's Game 5 at San Antonio's SBC Center.
A week, ago, the Spurs opened this series with convincing home victories - 103-81 on May 8 and 108-91 on May 10. They have, in fact, lost just four games at the SBC Center this entire season, dropping a mere three in the regular season and losing their playoff opener to Denver on April 24.
Which is why the Sonics know they must carry over every bit of the momentum from Sunday's lopsided win into tonight's contest.
"That same performance has to be put on the floor in San Antonio," said Seattle guard Ray Allen, who led Sunday's rout with 32 points. "And that's not that easy, playing in somebody else's building."
Added teammate Antonio Daniels, "In those first two games (in San Antonio) they took care of home. Now we've done the same thing they did. We took care of home. But to go down there again, we need to refocus ourselves."
Just as KeyArena was rocking from the noise of a spirited sellout crowd for Games 3 and 4, so will Spurs fans make plenty of ruckus for their ballclub tonight. Though NBA players become accustomed to hostile road venues, the din can sometimes have a smothering effect.
"Whenever you play on the road," Allen said, "what you worry about the most is loud noise when something goes wrong and you hang your heads. We just have to stay together as a team and not worry about what's going on in that building and what their fans are doing.
"We've got to beat this team," he said. "We're playing against the whole arena, but we've got to beat those five guys out on the floor. And to do that we've just got to stay together. When things go bad, we've just got to find a positive way."
It would be easy to think the Sonics have San Antonio's number, based on the ease with which they won on Sunday. Though the final margin was 12 points, Seattle led by 20 in the fourth quarter and Spurs center Tim Duncan spent most of the period on the bench, an indication that coach Gregg Popovich was waving the white flag.
Still, almost every NBA playoff series has its ebbs and flows, some of them dramatic. In the other Western Conference semifinal series, Phoenix routed Dallas in the opener, then lost Game 2 to the Mavericks. The teams traded one-sided wins in Games 3 and 4, leaving that series knotted 2-2.
Likewise, Detroit spanked Indiana in that opener, then was handled by the Pacers in Game 2. Again, the teams split the next two games, making that series also 2-2.
Which is why many of the Sonics were quick to caution against overconfidence in the wake of their back-to-back victories.
"We have a lot more confidence now than we did when we came home from San Antonio at 0-2," said forward Nick Collison. "I know we feel a lot better about ourselves on this team. But still, I don't think there's going to be much carryover on their side for the next game and I don't think there will be on ours either.
"I don't think the games carry over that much from one to the next," he went on. "You still have to come out and try to win each one. That's why you see these swings. Like in the Indiana-Detroit series, Indiana kills them in one game and Detroit kills them in the next. So it really doesn't seem to matter. Each game is a new game."
The bottom line, he added, "is that we still have to get a win in San Antonio."
No more tix for Game 6: Playoff tickets for the Sonics' showdown with the San Antonio Spurs in Game 6 of their Western Conference semifinal series sold out on Monday. The game will air locally on Fox Sports Net (cable) and on ESPN (cable).