tlongII
05-07-2014, 08:52 AM
http://www.oregonlive.com/sports/oregonian/john_canzano/index.ssf/2014/05/canzano_trail_blazers_taught_a.html#incart_m-rpt-2
http://imgick.oregonlive.com/home/olive-media/pgmain/img/oregonian/photo/2014/05/-3133dd98546882b8.jpg
San Antonio Spurs guard Tony Parker (9) scores over Portland Trail Blazers guard Damian Lillard (0).
SAN ANTONIO — Maybe you wished for a bout of amnesia as you went to bed on Tuesday night. Or that you'd wake up Wednesday with a mulligan. Or maybe you just clicked the heels of your sneakers together and hoped James Harden would suddenly reappear.
Instead, just this: Spurs 116, Blazers 92.
It's not going away.
Game 1 wasn't a game at all. But before we declare the series over and Portland done, take a tour of the San Antonio locker room with me.
Because on the wall between the lockers of residents Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili there is posted a beautifully framed quotation from social reformer and early 1900s journalist Jacob Riis.
It reads:
"When nothing seems to help, I go and look at a stonecutter hammering away at his rock perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred and first blow it will split in two, and I know it was not that blow that did it --- but all that had gone before."
Down the hallway as you exit the locker room this same Riis quote is also posted in French, Spanish and Portuguese. I'm thinking Spurs coach Gregg Popovich doesn't want any of his players to miss it, but today, it's the Blazers who might want to sneak in and absorb the lesson.
Nothing went right. Nothing went in. The Spurs' aging starters put on a clinic in the first half that could best be described as "Death by Pick-and-Roll." And the temptation for Portland is going to be to scrap everything they once knew to be true and attempt to start completely over in Game 2.
That would be a mistake.
The Blazers jumped in the second-round playoff ring and took a haymaker from the Spurs. They got knocked out, so badly that their mouthpieces flew out of the ring. But the "muckraking journalist" from the turn of the century makes a nice point today.
The Blazers don't need to scrap their plan, or gravitate away from the things that helped them win 58 games this season. Rather, they need to be sharper, more focused, and continue to hammer at the stone, even if it appears to be a pointless labor.
That's the only way you beat the Spurs.
I examined that quote on Tuesday as I waited in the Spurs locker room for Duncan to come out of the shower. His teammates, one by one, walked out of the shower area with towels around them. They sat at their lockers, dressing, and quietly talking.
Suddenly, a guy comes out of the shower area fully dressed, as if this is some kind of magic act. I don't know if he ran between the water or if he snapped his fingers and clothes appeared, but he has jeans on, a plaid button-up shirt, and his brown work boots are tied. It's the 38-year-old Duncan. And he's ready to talk.
"They'll be more physical, they'll make adjustments, this is just the beginning ... We had a great Game 7. You don't know how you're going to come out (in a Game 1), but to come out like that, to have a night like that, you have to take it."
Duncan's been at this a long time. Game 1 was the 219th playoff game of his career. For Damian Lillard in the other locker room this was No. 7. For LaMarcus Aldridge this was No. 25. There was no celebrating in the Spurs locker room. It was subdued. In fact, you could have teleported into the room from the moon, surveyed the room, and other than Duncan's comments, you'd have been unable to discern if it was a 24-point victory or loss.
Portland could learn something from this. The highs will be high. The lows will be low. The winning team in a seven-game series will look as if it could never lose again, the losing team as if it will never win. But the truth of this series lies in recognizing that every game is a valuable and unique independent event, none worth more than the others.
Regardless, keep hammering.
The Blazers must play better pick-and-roll defense. They must shoot better. They must avoid doing what they did in the first half when nothing seemed to be going their way — they got away from the things that made them special this season.
Lillard stopped creating. Aldridge got frustrated. Wesley Matthews started to reach on defense. Nic Batum lost his confidence. The bench players came in and looked wide-eyed after being so effective against the Rockets.
The result was a collective meltdown.
I missed Harden dribbling all over. I missed Dwight Howard glaring at his teammates. I missed Kevin McHale limping around the opposing sideline. I'll bet you did, too. But this is the beauty of the playoffs, you get to measure your best against theirs. Portland's best wasn't close to good enough in Game 1, but that only means they're down 0-1.
The Blazers must continue to hammer at the Spurs as if they were stone. Portland must commit to dictating tempo in Game 2, and staying with their offense. Coach Terry Stotts must make a defensive adjustment, but avoid wholesale panic, because abandoning the things that made the Blazers dangerous will only amplify the catastrophic result of a single game into a full-scale series crisis.
I asked Duncan if he could feel a 24-point ambush coming. Did the Spurs wake up especially hungry? After all these years in the playoffs, does he ever sense in their walk-through that everything will click? Did he see this happening against Portland?
"No — you never know what you're going to get."
Like a box of chocolates.
San Antonio's game plan revolved around attacking the weak side of Portland's defense as if it were stone. They brought the ball to the spaces on the weak side, and just went Pick-and-Roll-Palooza on the Blazers. Then, they rested.
It happens. The Blazers walked into an uppercut thrown by the defending conference champions. But they can only afford two more of these.
http://imgick.oregonlive.com/home/olive-media/pgmain/img/oregonian/photo/2014/05/-3133dd98546882b8.jpg
San Antonio Spurs guard Tony Parker (9) scores over Portland Trail Blazers guard Damian Lillard (0).
SAN ANTONIO — Maybe you wished for a bout of amnesia as you went to bed on Tuesday night. Or that you'd wake up Wednesday with a mulligan. Or maybe you just clicked the heels of your sneakers together and hoped James Harden would suddenly reappear.
Instead, just this: Spurs 116, Blazers 92.
It's not going away.
Game 1 wasn't a game at all. But before we declare the series over and Portland done, take a tour of the San Antonio locker room with me.
Because on the wall between the lockers of residents Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili there is posted a beautifully framed quotation from social reformer and early 1900s journalist Jacob Riis.
It reads:
"When nothing seems to help, I go and look at a stonecutter hammering away at his rock perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred and first blow it will split in two, and I know it was not that blow that did it --- but all that had gone before."
Down the hallway as you exit the locker room this same Riis quote is also posted in French, Spanish and Portuguese. I'm thinking Spurs coach Gregg Popovich doesn't want any of his players to miss it, but today, it's the Blazers who might want to sneak in and absorb the lesson.
Nothing went right. Nothing went in. The Spurs' aging starters put on a clinic in the first half that could best be described as "Death by Pick-and-Roll." And the temptation for Portland is going to be to scrap everything they once knew to be true and attempt to start completely over in Game 2.
That would be a mistake.
The Blazers jumped in the second-round playoff ring and took a haymaker from the Spurs. They got knocked out, so badly that their mouthpieces flew out of the ring. But the "muckraking journalist" from the turn of the century makes a nice point today.
The Blazers don't need to scrap their plan, or gravitate away from the things that helped them win 58 games this season. Rather, they need to be sharper, more focused, and continue to hammer at the stone, even if it appears to be a pointless labor.
That's the only way you beat the Spurs.
I examined that quote on Tuesday as I waited in the Spurs locker room for Duncan to come out of the shower. His teammates, one by one, walked out of the shower area with towels around them. They sat at their lockers, dressing, and quietly talking.
Suddenly, a guy comes out of the shower area fully dressed, as if this is some kind of magic act. I don't know if he ran between the water or if he snapped his fingers and clothes appeared, but he has jeans on, a plaid button-up shirt, and his brown work boots are tied. It's the 38-year-old Duncan. And he's ready to talk.
"They'll be more physical, they'll make adjustments, this is just the beginning ... We had a great Game 7. You don't know how you're going to come out (in a Game 1), but to come out like that, to have a night like that, you have to take it."
Duncan's been at this a long time. Game 1 was the 219th playoff game of his career. For Damian Lillard in the other locker room this was No. 7. For LaMarcus Aldridge this was No. 25. There was no celebrating in the Spurs locker room. It was subdued. In fact, you could have teleported into the room from the moon, surveyed the room, and other than Duncan's comments, you'd have been unable to discern if it was a 24-point victory or loss.
Portland could learn something from this. The highs will be high. The lows will be low. The winning team in a seven-game series will look as if it could never lose again, the losing team as if it will never win. But the truth of this series lies in recognizing that every game is a valuable and unique independent event, none worth more than the others.
Regardless, keep hammering.
The Blazers must play better pick-and-roll defense. They must shoot better. They must avoid doing what they did in the first half when nothing seemed to be going their way — they got away from the things that made them special this season.
Lillard stopped creating. Aldridge got frustrated. Wesley Matthews started to reach on defense. Nic Batum lost his confidence. The bench players came in and looked wide-eyed after being so effective against the Rockets.
The result was a collective meltdown.
I missed Harden dribbling all over. I missed Dwight Howard glaring at his teammates. I missed Kevin McHale limping around the opposing sideline. I'll bet you did, too. But this is the beauty of the playoffs, you get to measure your best against theirs. Portland's best wasn't close to good enough in Game 1, but that only means they're down 0-1.
The Blazers must continue to hammer at the Spurs as if they were stone. Portland must commit to dictating tempo in Game 2, and staying with their offense. Coach Terry Stotts must make a defensive adjustment, but avoid wholesale panic, because abandoning the things that made the Blazers dangerous will only amplify the catastrophic result of a single game into a full-scale series crisis.
I asked Duncan if he could feel a 24-point ambush coming. Did the Spurs wake up especially hungry? After all these years in the playoffs, does he ever sense in their walk-through that everything will click? Did he see this happening against Portland?
"No — you never know what you're going to get."
Like a box of chocolates.
San Antonio's game plan revolved around attacking the weak side of Portland's defense as if it were stone. They brought the ball to the spaces on the weak side, and just went Pick-and-Roll-Palooza on the Blazers. Then, they rested.
It happens. The Blazers walked into an uppercut thrown by the defending conference champions. But they can only afford two more of these.