howard2
11-16-2005, 06:00 PM
HOOPSWORLD.com
By Emmett Shaw
Nov 16, 2005
Link: Hoopsworld.com (http://www.hoopsworld.com/article_14993.shtml)
SPURS: Phenom Bruce Bowen Playing Superbly
UPDATED – SPURS OVER ATLANTA HAWKS 103-79:
After all in this game, a sellout at the SBC Center, you had the defending NBA Champs at home against a young and winless visitor. So instead of tracking the usual notes to identify keys and turning points, HOOPSWORLD.com simply planned to chart who guarded Joe Johnson and Tim Duncan on each possession of the game.
However the story that immediately developed was Al Harrington blowing up on Tim Duncan and the rest of the San Antonio starters in the opening quarter. Al scored 22 points in the 1st quarter, just 6 shy of Dominique’s all-time Hawks record for points in a frame. So by the 2nd quarter our approach changed to charting who Bruce Bowen was guarding, since he began checking Harrington for most of the 2nd quarter, along with some 1-2-2 zone mixed in, with Bowen at the top.
Bruce had guarded Joe Johnson during the 1st period. For the game, we unofficially found that Bruce Bowen gave up only 6 points individually all evening – Joe Johnson made a layup with 6:05 in the 1st, Harrington made a free throw at 8:03 of the 3rd, and Tyronn Lue made a 3-point play at 8:42 of the 4th (when the Spurs’ inside help was late on a baseline drive by the little guy).
Although the Hawks are a bad NBA team, not organized enough to flash a powerful guy like Al Harrington into the post against a much smaller foe like Bruce, it’s still impressive that Bowen was able to basically shut out a hot talent like Al, who had Bruce outweighed by 50 pounds. The fireman was called to put out the blaze and he doused it (Harrington finished with 23 points). Meanwhile Atlanta began to turn the ball over – 14 turnovers in the middle two periods, compared to only 1 turnover they made in the opening stanza, which the Hawks dominated 31-18.
The Hawks then crumbled in this game, as expected. Steve Belkin looked like a clown over the summer when he wanted to negotiate tougher with Phoenix and got voted down by the rest of the owners of the Hawks, who also played the Atlanta media to smear Belkin. But when you see Atlanta paying Joe Johnson $70 million, and his being contained by a minimum-wager like Melvin Sanders for much of this game, Joe not having much of a playmaking role, and the Peach State’s team giving up two #1s and Boris Diaw, you have to say that Belkin had at least some merit.
As for the Spurs, this scrimmage game was what the doctor ordered, what with their one-game losing streak, Houston and Phoenix coming to town later this week, and Michael Finley and Brent Barry still injured. Both players are on the mend and feeling better, a Spurs’ spokesman told HOOPSWORLD.com, but neither has practiced since the injury. Finley was on the court shooting prior to the Atlanta game, however, his perfect ball rotation again in evidence.
Bowen said after the game of guarding Harrington’s bulk, that “you have to have the heart of a lion at times...” And Bruce said he had his teammates to help in such situations too: Harrington hit the offensive boards against Bruce, but there was too much traffic for it to pay off for the Hawks. Of Al, Bowen said, “He was in a groove in the 1st quarter. I mean, he hit some tough shots and my thing was trying to just take him out of his rhythm and work for more of his shots, and it just so happened it went that way.”
Gregg Popovich analyzed Bowen’s checking of Harrington, “(Bowen) uses his brains and doing his work early. Great desire. He just figures it out. He does a great job in that regard.” You have to believe that Bruce had no idea in his pregame prep that he would guard Al at all, since JJ is Atlanta’s main scorer, averaging nearly 20 per. Bowen must have been pretty zeroed in on Johnson, then he had to move over to a hot 4-man who can score inside and out -- and Bruce then succeeds in closing the gaping door? Imagine Bowen in a playoff series when he gets extensive video preparation on all his potential assignments.
Pregame Article – published yesterday:
“He’s a phenom on the defensive end,” says the Spurs’ Sean Marks of Bruce Bowen. “He can guard several different positions and is a real problem on the defensive end for other teams.” Bruce Bowen played a big role in salvaging San Antonio’s now completed 3-2 road trip when his reserve help Michael Finley and Brent Barry were injured partway through the Spurs’ journey through Dallas, Chicago, Charlotte, Boston, and Washington.
Bruce is now averaging over 33 minutes per game, a career high, and in the last four contests Bowen has played a whopping 39.26 minutes per! That’s a numeral that would put him in the NBA’s Top 15 for the seasonal statistic so far. Everyone hoped, with the addition of Fin, that Bruce’s court time could be governed, to a certain extent, like Robert Horry’s has been over the course of Rob’s years in San Antonio. Keep Bruce, now 34, more healthy and hearty for the big games.
San Antonio’s injuries have changed all of that for now. Bowen, who is a regular on the All-Defensive team, played 42 minutes in the blowout loss to Washington. (By the way, that was a game that should raise eyebrows around the NBA, many of them in South Florida.) Melvin Sanders has been re-acquired by the Spurs since the injuries hit, after being waived toward the end of pre-season. Sanders (6-5, 210) has a ton of heart, is a good young athlete, and a sincere defender along the lines of, well, Bruce Bowen.
Bowen’s increased playing time isn’t just a function of the injuries. Bruce has also outright earned a boost. He’s second among qualified 3-point shooters in the league in 2005-06 with an amazing 65% mark on 2.4 tries per game. He has had tremendous defensive outings versus Paul Pierce and Ben Gordon and also helped limit LeBron to a pedestrian night for King James. Aggregated, those three stars shot 38% from the field and averaged 18 points against the Spurs in their various games.
Though as versatile as Marks observed, Bruce is at his best against guys like Gordon, a little bit shorter than Bowen’s 6-7 height. The perfect illustration was a game last season versus Seattle in which Flip Murray tried to shake Bruce up with some street moves while Bowen remained affixed. Bowen has been known to check everyone from Steve Nash to Dirk Nowitzki; few who have ever played basketball have done such varied defensive tasks.
Bruce could do little with Dirk in their meeting this season, as Nowitzki kept his cool and used his size. Dirk has seen it all by now and knows what to do. Gilbert Arenas also provided problems for Bruce after Arenas had already gotten out of hand. Against Tony Parker, from the start of the Spurs last game, Gilbert started feeling good. Tony tends to bite on pump fakes, whereas the phenom Bruce might react to them with a quick arm and hand, but not necessarily with his 200-pound body weight.
Despite a couple of lopsided scores that the Spurs have now lost by – both games on the road and both on the second of back-to-backs – San Antonio is running a decent #4 NBA-wide in point differential. Detroit is tops and Cleveland is third. Guess what team is right on the Pistons’ heels? Washington! The Wizards showed good body language when smoking the Spurs. No fist waving. They just fell back on defense, and later left the court, with an air of this-is-supposed-to-happen. So watch out for the Wiz this year.
Arenas may have turned a career corner. He had Terrell Owens disease for about 3 seasons, but a couple of nights ago he did a super job of picking his spots while lighting up the Spurs for 43. A quota so large is very rarely posted versus the Spurs unless Amare Stoudemire is playing. Arenas can control a game like few can because he stays on the floor instead of leaves it before deciding what to do. Like Bird, Magic, and Kidd, Arenas keeps his options open: Drive, Pass, Shoot. If Eddie Jordan keeps counseling him so well, Washington could push Miami into a lesser seed in the league’s convoluted playoff format.
More likely, the Heat will eventually win a Southeast divisional race they didn’t think they would have, and the Wizards will face either Indiana or Detroit in the first round. Miami would actually have the easier road to the Finals as a 2nd or 3rd seed. It’s wacky, but you could see the teams with the two best records in the league fight it out in the East’s second round if the Pistons and Pacers meet up – this while the Heat are getting ready by making short work of a team like New Jersey, which Miami did last season in the opening round.
And it would be a shame if the Spurs aren’t there waiting for whomever is left standing. But don’t get married to every preseason notion. You at least need pre-nup. The Spurs still look like the Western favorite, but the East could produce a great Finals team. Out of the possibilities, I’d rather face the Pistons coming out of the East’s hazy maze. Indiana could be the best team, but with the hardest road. Miami will be just gearing up, and with a sweet draw. Detroit is Detroit. They can be had.
A hundred articles were written around the league about the silly new dress code in preseason, but you never hear a peep about the league’s need to modify its crazy playoff system. Except maybe here at HOOPSWORLD.com.
By Emmett Shaw
Nov 16, 2005
Link: Hoopsworld.com (http://www.hoopsworld.com/article_14993.shtml)
SPURS: Phenom Bruce Bowen Playing Superbly
UPDATED – SPURS OVER ATLANTA HAWKS 103-79:
After all in this game, a sellout at the SBC Center, you had the defending NBA Champs at home against a young and winless visitor. So instead of tracking the usual notes to identify keys and turning points, HOOPSWORLD.com simply planned to chart who guarded Joe Johnson and Tim Duncan on each possession of the game.
However the story that immediately developed was Al Harrington blowing up on Tim Duncan and the rest of the San Antonio starters in the opening quarter. Al scored 22 points in the 1st quarter, just 6 shy of Dominique’s all-time Hawks record for points in a frame. So by the 2nd quarter our approach changed to charting who Bruce Bowen was guarding, since he began checking Harrington for most of the 2nd quarter, along with some 1-2-2 zone mixed in, with Bowen at the top.
Bruce had guarded Joe Johnson during the 1st period. For the game, we unofficially found that Bruce Bowen gave up only 6 points individually all evening – Joe Johnson made a layup with 6:05 in the 1st, Harrington made a free throw at 8:03 of the 3rd, and Tyronn Lue made a 3-point play at 8:42 of the 4th (when the Spurs’ inside help was late on a baseline drive by the little guy).
Although the Hawks are a bad NBA team, not organized enough to flash a powerful guy like Al Harrington into the post against a much smaller foe like Bruce, it’s still impressive that Bowen was able to basically shut out a hot talent like Al, who had Bruce outweighed by 50 pounds. The fireman was called to put out the blaze and he doused it (Harrington finished with 23 points). Meanwhile Atlanta began to turn the ball over – 14 turnovers in the middle two periods, compared to only 1 turnover they made in the opening stanza, which the Hawks dominated 31-18.
The Hawks then crumbled in this game, as expected. Steve Belkin looked like a clown over the summer when he wanted to negotiate tougher with Phoenix and got voted down by the rest of the owners of the Hawks, who also played the Atlanta media to smear Belkin. But when you see Atlanta paying Joe Johnson $70 million, and his being contained by a minimum-wager like Melvin Sanders for much of this game, Joe not having much of a playmaking role, and the Peach State’s team giving up two #1s and Boris Diaw, you have to say that Belkin had at least some merit.
As for the Spurs, this scrimmage game was what the doctor ordered, what with their one-game losing streak, Houston and Phoenix coming to town later this week, and Michael Finley and Brent Barry still injured. Both players are on the mend and feeling better, a Spurs’ spokesman told HOOPSWORLD.com, but neither has practiced since the injury. Finley was on the court shooting prior to the Atlanta game, however, his perfect ball rotation again in evidence.
Bowen said after the game of guarding Harrington’s bulk, that “you have to have the heart of a lion at times...” And Bruce said he had his teammates to help in such situations too: Harrington hit the offensive boards against Bruce, but there was too much traffic for it to pay off for the Hawks. Of Al, Bowen said, “He was in a groove in the 1st quarter. I mean, he hit some tough shots and my thing was trying to just take him out of his rhythm and work for more of his shots, and it just so happened it went that way.”
Gregg Popovich analyzed Bowen’s checking of Harrington, “(Bowen) uses his brains and doing his work early. Great desire. He just figures it out. He does a great job in that regard.” You have to believe that Bruce had no idea in his pregame prep that he would guard Al at all, since JJ is Atlanta’s main scorer, averaging nearly 20 per. Bowen must have been pretty zeroed in on Johnson, then he had to move over to a hot 4-man who can score inside and out -- and Bruce then succeeds in closing the gaping door? Imagine Bowen in a playoff series when he gets extensive video preparation on all his potential assignments.
Pregame Article – published yesterday:
“He’s a phenom on the defensive end,” says the Spurs’ Sean Marks of Bruce Bowen. “He can guard several different positions and is a real problem on the defensive end for other teams.” Bruce Bowen played a big role in salvaging San Antonio’s now completed 3-2 road trip when his reserve help Michael Finley and Brent Barry were injured partway through the Spurs’ journey through Dallas, Chicago, Charlotte, Boston, and Washington.
Bruce is now averaging over 33 minutes per game, a career high, and in the last four contests Bowen has played a whopping 39.26 minutes per! That’s a numeral that would put him in the NBA’s Top 15 for the seasonal statistic so far. Everyone hoped, with the addition of Fin, that Bruce’s court time could be governed, to a certain extent, like Robert Horry’s has been over the course of Rob’s years in San Antonio. Keep Bruce, now 34, more healthy and hearty for the big games.
San Antonio’s injuries have changed all of that for now. Bowen, who is a regular on the All-Defensive team, played 42 minutes in the blowout loss to Washington. (By the way, that was a game that should raise eyebrows around the NBA, many of them in South Florida.) Melvin Sanders has been re-acquired by the Spurs since the injuries hit, after being waived toward the end of pre-season. Sanders (6-5, 210) has a ton of heart, is a good young athlete, and a sincere defender along the lines of, well, Bruce Bowen.
Bowen’s increased playing time isn’t just a function of the injuries. Bruce has also outright earned a boost. He’s second among qualified 3-point shooters in the league in 2005-06 with an amazing 65% mark on 2.4 tries per game. He has had tremendous defensive outings versus Paul Pierce and Ben Gordon and also helped limit LeBron to a pedestrian night for King James. Aggregated, those three stars shot 38% from the field and averaged 18 points against the Spurs in their various games.
Though as versatile as Marks observed, Bruce is at his best against guys like Gordon, a little bit shorter than Bowen’s 6-7 height. The perfect illustration was a game last season versus Seattle in which Flip Murray tried to shake Bruce up with some street moves while Bowen remained affixed. Bowen has been known to check everyone from Steve Nash to Dirk Nowitzki; few who have ever played basketball have done such varied defensive tasks.
Bruce could do little with Dirk in their meeting this season, as Nowitzki kept his cool and used his size. Dirk has seen it all by now and knows what to do. Gilbert Arenas also provided problems for Bruce after Arenas had already gotten out of hand. Against Tony Parker, from the start of the Spurs last game, Gilbert started feeling good. Tony tends to bite on pump fakes, whereas the phenom Bruce might react to them with a quick arm and hand, but not necessarily with his 200-pound body weight.
Despite a couple of lopsided scores that the Spurs have now lost by – both games on the road and both on the second of back-to-backs – San Antonio is running a decent #4 NBA-wide in point differential. Detroit is tops and Cleveland is third. Guess what team is right on the Pistons’ heels? Washington! The Wizards showed good body language when smoking the Spurs. No fist waving. They just fell back on defense, and later left the court, with an air of this-is-supposed-to-happen. So watch out for the Wiz this year.
Arenas may have turned a career corner. He had Terrell Owens disease for about 3 seasons, but a couple of nights ago he did a super job of picking his spots while lighting up the Spurs for 43. A quota so large is very rarely posted versus the Spurs unless Amare Stoudemire is playing. Arenas can control a game like few can because he stays on the floor instead of leaves it before deciding what to do. Like Bird, Magic, and Kidd, Arenas keeps his options open: Drive, Pass, Shoot. If Eddie Jordan keeps counseling him so well, Washington could push Miami into a lesser seed in the league’s convoluted playoff format.
More likely, the Heat will eventually win a Southeast divisional race they didn’t think they would have, and the Wizards will face either Indiana or Detroit in the first round. Miami would actually have the easier road to the Finals as a 2nd or 3rd seed. It’s wacky, but you could see the teams with the two best records in the league fight it out in the East’s second round if the Pistons and Pacers meet up – this while the Heat are getting ready by making short work of a team like New Jersey, which Miami did last season in the opening round.
And it would be a shame if the Spurs aren’t there waiting for whomever is left standing. But don’t get married to every preseason notion. You at least need pre-nup. The Spurs still look like the Western favorite, but the East could produce a great Finals team. Out of the possibilities, I’d rather face the Pistons coming out of the East’s hazy maze. Indiana could be the best team, but with the hardest road. Miami will be just gearing up, and with a sweet draw. Detroit is Detroit. They can be had.
A hundred articles were written around the league about the silly new dress code in preseason, but you never hear a peep about the league’s need to modify its crazy playoff system. Except maybe here at HOOPSWORLD.com.