Spurs vs Thunder Previews

[duncan228]

Game is Saturday, 7:30 CST.


Saturday: Thunder (23-11) at Spurs (28-4) (http://blog.mysanantonio.com/spursnation/2010/12/31/saturday-thunder-23-11-at-spurs-28-4/)
Jeff McDonald

...Spurs beat the Thunder 117-104 in Oklahoma City on Nov. 14. Matt Bonner had 21 points and went 7 for 7 from 3-point range. … Spurs own a four-game winning streak over Thunder...

http://blog.mysanantonio.com/spursnation/2010/12/31/saturday-thunder-23-11-at-spurs-28-4/

*********************

Spurs’ resolution is to play better ‘D’ (http://blog.mysanantonio.com/spursnation/2010/12/31/spurs%e2%80%99-resolution-is-to-play-better-%e2%80%98d%e2%80%99/)
Jeff McDonald

http://blog.mysanantonio.com/spursnation/2010/12/31/spurs%e2%80%99-resolution-is-to-play-better-%e2%80%98d%e2%80%99/

[DieHardSpursFan1537]

Should be a Spurs victory. OKC is crumbling to pieces at the moment.

29-4

:flag:

[stealthjbravo]

They looked pretty bad against ATL tonight. Im sure they will fail on the back to back.

[Andy25]

They looked pretty bad against ATL tonight. Im sure they will fail on the back to back.

They're a young team, I don't thinka b2b2 will have as much of an affect on them, but yeah I hope the Spurs win. Go Spurs Go!

[stealthjbravo]

They were running their asses of tonight. Both teams looked bad. Go Spurs!

[duncan228]

Oklahoma City (23-11) at San Antonio (28-4) (http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/preview?gid=2011010124)
Tipoff: 8:30 pm EST Sat Jan 1, 2011
TV: FSOK, FSSW
By Jeff Bartl

The San Antonio Spurs have dominated the NBA thus far in 2010-11.

They’ve fared well against the Oklahoma City Thunder for years.

San Antonio looks for its 12th straight home victory and fourth consecutive overall Saturday night against Oklahoma City.

The Spurs (28-4), owners of the league’s best record and off to the best start in franchise history, won for the 13th time in 14 games Thursday, beating Dallas 99-93. While San Antonio put an extra game in the standings between itself and its closest pursuer in the Southwest Division, coach Gregg Popovich wasn’t very impressed as the Mavericks were without an injured Dirk Nowitzki.

“We don’t take too much out of the win,” Popovich said. “We didn’t show very much. We didn’t improve as a team, that’s for sure.”

Tim Duncan had 17 points and 11 rebounds, bouncing back from a career low-tying two-point effort in Tuesday’s victory over the Los Angeles Lakers. It also ended his season-high four-game drought without a double-double.

“It’s nice to get some baskets to go down, get some rebounds and play a little better to help the team,” Duncan said. “We can attack in different ways. That’s what we’ve been hanging our hat on all season.”

Duncan has 33 double-doubles in 47 career games against the Oklahoma City franchise, but he scored only six points and had four rebounds in the Spurs’ 117-104 road win over the Thunder on Nov. 14.

Despite Duncan’s lackluster individual performance, the Spurs defeated the Thunder for the fourth consecutive time. Dating to April 1998, they have taken 34 of the last 48 meetings between these franchises. The Thunder were the Seattle SuperSonics for all but the last nine of those contests.

Oklahoma City (23-11) looks for its third straight victory overall after defeating Atlanta 103-94 on Friday night. Kevin Durant’s 33 points capped a memorable 2010 for the 22-year-old superstar, who leads the NBA with 28.3 points per game.

During the calendar year, Durant became the youngest scoring champion in NBA history, led the Thunder to the playoffs for the first time and earned MVP honors for the U.S. national team during its run to its first world championship since 1994.

He also signed a five-year, $85 million extension during the offseason.

“I’m just so blessed to be given a lot of opportunities and just thankful for everything,” Durant said. “To sign that contract was probably one of the highlights because that really shows that you’ve grown as a player in this league.”

Despite the individual accomplishments, Durant has always had a team-first attitude and watched as Russell Westbrook recorded his third career triple-double with 23 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists against the Hawks.

Oklahoma City has won nine of 12 and jumped idle Utah for first place in the Northwest Division.

“It was so much fun just to kind of transform into a different team, a different identity and be known as a team that can win basketball games,” Durant said.

*********************

Team Stat Leaders

Points
Kevin Durant OKC 28.1
Manu Ginobili SA 19.0

Rebounds
Serge Ibaka OKC 6.5
Tim Duncan SA 9.4

Assists
Russell Westbrook OKC 8.1
Tony Parker SA 7.0

http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/preview?gid=2011010124

[mavs>spurs]

need jefferson to play some bowen-style defense on durant imo.

[100%duncan]

need jefferson to play some bowen-style defense on durant imo.

but he cant. he just needs to play great D against KD and get helped on the double teams

[Rather.Unique]

for some reason OKC scares me more than DAL & LA. this team is obviously young and very talented, they can go off on anyone on any given night.

[DMC]

Doesn't really matter, young players get tired too, they're just less likely to get injured.
It certainly matters that the team is young. When you get older you will realize that. Sure people get tired, but there's a reason Lance cannot win the TDF any more, and why Duncan isn't the beast he once was, and why Robinson retired. Players get older, they need longer to recharge.

[DMC]

for some reason OKC scares me more than DAL & LA. this team is obviously young and very talented, they can go off on anyone on any given night.

Let's hope they don't scare the Spurs. Scaring you is ok.

They are a good running team. They get out on the break and finish well. They are not well disciplined and do not manage the clock well. Westbrook is good, but he thinks hes better than he is. They settle for outside shots a lot, and if they are on it's game over, but when they start missing those they don't really have a back up plan. None of their bigs are intimidating. Durant plays like Dirk, great outside shooter but not a real paint presence on defense. He can be though, so it depends on which one shows up.

On the other end, the Spurs have this tendency of starting slow and building speed. Sometimes that bites them in the ass. They also have a tendency to only play well enough to win. They can be up by 20 in the 1st and win by 4. They can be down by 15 in the 1st and win by 10. They seem to need inspiration on a nightly basis to do their jobs. It generally takes someone issuing a hard foul or a few bad calls to galvanize them then it's off to the races.

[100%duncan]

for some reason OKC scares me more than DAL & LA. this team is obviously young and very talented, they can go off on anyone on any given night.

OKC is lost at the moment. Wont be much of a threat for me though

[Danny.Zhu]

Should be a Spurs victory. OKC is crumbling to pieces at the moment.

29-4

:flag:

Clipper was much worse at the time they beat us.

[Fireball]

3 things:

1. Play the same defense as in the 2nd half of the last meeting
2. Watch out for James Harden - he was not himself at the start of the season
3. Switch Andrew Monaco for the female OKC sideline reporter

Happy new year!

[easy7]

Thanks to this game for me, New Years will be better than usual, here is hoping for a Spur's win. :toast :flag: :flag: :flag:

[ChuckD]

for some reason OKC scares me more than DAL & LA. this team is obviously young and very talented, they can go off on anyone on any given night.

You'd think so, but we just seem to be a bad matchup for them. We took 3/4 last year and handily won game one this year. They've had a bad drop in defensive intensity this year, too. They're not as good, and are sneaking up on no one.

[shelshor]

http://www.nba.com/news/referee.html
Referee Assignments
Sat. Jan. 1
Oklahoma City @ San Antonio: Joe Crawford; Tony Brown; Eric Dalen

[Spurs Brazil]

http://www.nba.com/news/referee.html
Referee Assignments
Sat. Jan. 1
Oklahoma City @ San Antonio: Joe Crawford; Tony Brown; Eric Dalen

Great way to start the year :lol

[Leftyventricle]

I hope bonner eats a turkey sub today.

bmczlDDZJ8E

[ElNono]

It's all about stopping Westbrook IMO. Durant is going to get his, but if you let Westbrook have a triple double like he had last night against ATL, they're gonna be tough to beat.
Outside of those two, nobody else can create their own shot. That's why it's important to stop the guy that creates for them.
Hopefully Hill can give some solid perimeter D against him.

[Frenchise player]

Another exciting game tonight, and this time the opposite team will be at full strenght.
The Spurs should win this one at home but OKC could be fired up to play against the league's best record.

[TampaDude]

OKC has no D. The Spurs will run them out of the AT&T Center.

Spurs 115
Thunder 90

[SpursRulez4eVeR]

http://i30.tinypic.com/2nvgxhx.jpg
look at that POS harden was clapping thinking the ball was out of bound off the spurs but then supermanu saved it:rollin

[Fireball]

look at that POS harden was clapping thinking the ball was out of bound off the spurs but then supermanu saved it:rollin

I simply love that sequence ... combined with RJs game winner this was the best play of the last season!

[duncan228]

Advanced Scouting: Oklahoma City Thunder at San Antonio Spurs (http://www.48minutesofhell.com/spurs-stats-advanced-scouting-oklahoma-city-thunder-san-antonio-spurs)
by Scott Sereday
48 Minutes of Hell

http://www.48minutesofhell.com/spurs-stats-advanced-scouting-oklahoma-city-thunder-san-antonio-spurs

[duncan228]

Spurs wary of Westbrook’s contributions for OKC (http://blog.mysanantonio.com/spursnation/2011/01/01/spurs-wary-of-westbrook-and-his-contributions-for-okc/)
Tim Griffin

...“They are very good and create a lot of matchup problems,” Spurs guard Tony Parker said. “They are young and very athletic. They are tough on the boards and have scorers, too.”


...“(Westbrook's) playing at an All-Star level this season,” Spurs guard George Hill said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t make it because his numbers are great.”

http://blog.mysanantonio.com/spursnation/2011/01/01/spurs-wary-of-westbrook-and-his-contributions-for-okc/

[Dex]

http://blog.mysanantonio.com/spursnation/2011/01/01/spurs-wary-of-westbrook-and-his-contributions-for-okc/


.“(Westbrook's) playing at an All-Star level this season,” Spurs guard George Hill said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t make it because his numbers are great.”

George double-negatived Westbrook out of the ASG.

[Doctor J]

George double-negatived Westbrook out of the ASG.


Ha Ha. I saw that, too. :lol

George Hill must be either very clever or so terrible in English grammar.