SpursFanFirst
05-29-2007, 01:07 PM
Spurs show champion's poise in Game 4 win
Charley Rosen / FOXSports.com
Posted: 8 hours ago
The Spurs are in command of the Western Conference Finals after besting the Jazz 91-79 in a wild, slam-bang contest.
That's a far cry from Utah's blowout win in Game 3, and Monday's loss shows why the Jazz are still a far cry from elite.
First of all, it should be noted that Steve Javie, Ken Mauer, and Joe DeRosa had worse games than any of the players. For no discernible reasons, some flops were ignored, some were penalized, and some were rewarded. And because of the routine mayhem permitted to transpire in the middle, most of the players will no doubt be suffering from scratches, bumps and bruises from their elbows to their fingertips. Things got so chaotic that whenever a whistle sounded the players had no idea what the forthcoming call would be.
Here's an incident that showed exactly how confused the refs really were: The Spurs had the ball when a pass to the wing was clearly deflected out of bounds by Andrei Kirilenko but Mauer indicated that Bruce Bowen had touched the ball last and awarded possession to Utah. After a quick conference, however, the three refs determined that Bowen had not touched the ball and that it belonged to San Antonio.
OK. Well done.
But one of the refs was wearing a wire, and during their deliberation Mauer said, "Kirilenko deflected the ball, and I don't know if it went off Bowen or not."
Really? Then why did he make the bogus call in the first place?
The only positive outcome of the refs' collective incompetence is that it didn't particularly favor either team.
Sure, the Spurs shot 41 free throws to Utah's 20, but that's because Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili consistently drove the ball to the hole. Meanwhile, only Deron Williams did the same for the Jazz.
And with Fabricio Oberto's solid defense on Carlos Boozer, Utah's man in the middle was virtually reduced to being a jump shooter. As a result, Boozer shot zero free throws.
Though Williams continued to be practically unstoppable 11-of-21, 10 assists, 27 points he received little help from his teammates.
While Kirilenko threatened and blocked several shots coming to the ball from the weak-side, he shot decently (3-of-7) but threw away several critical passes in the fourth quarter.
As before, Mehmet Okur did a terrific job in defending Duncan, but still had trouble putting the ball into the hole in his own right 3-of-7, 7 points.
Derek Fisher, Paul Millsap, Gordan Giricek, and Matt Harpring shot a collective 6-of-16. And that was that.
With the game on the line, San Antonio forced Williams to go right, then tried to pin him along the baseline with rotating bigs. This tactic worked more times than it failed, and once Williams' offense was stifled, the Jazz faded in a hurry.
With an offense that was so oriented toward jump shooting, Utah's only chance to win the game was with its defense. And they took advantage of Duncan's habits in the post of dribbling too much without gaining much ground, and of dribbling with the ball too far away from his body. This enabled Okur, Fisher and Williams to attack Duncan's exposed handle with great success. Utah's relentless digging and sniping also revealed that Duncan is not an especially adept passer when he's in motion.
In fact, Duncan was so discombobulated that on one sequence he lost track of the shot clock and was caught dribbling the ball as the timer detonated. All in all, it was an embarrassing performance for the Big Fundamental.
Duncan did make an adjustment in the second half. When posted, he put the ball on the floor only once, then tucked the ball into his stomach as he turned and made contact with Okur. By getting into Okur's body, Duncan succeeded in limiting his defender's ability to reach out and touch the ball.
However, Duncan is only comfortable making these kinds of moves from the right box. From the left box, he winds up lurching to the baseline and tossing up out-of-control flippers. Instead of stepping back and forcing TD to finish from there, Okur was much too aggressive and bailed Duncan out several times with unnecessary fouls.
In addition to controlling Duncan (6-of-13 for 19 points), the Jazz also stymied Parker by converging on him whenever he carried the ball into the lane. As a result, Parker was 6-of-19 and tallied only 17 points. Still, Parker showed his toughness by refusing to back down. Like a Joe Palooka punching dummy that I once got for my birthday, Parker jumped back up every time he was knocked down.
In the end, though, it was Ginobili who was the deciding factor. Driving, scampering, rebounding, stealing and even dropping an occasional triple, Ginobili was simply relentless. His head-long penetrations forced the Jazz to foul him, hence his 12-of-15 from the stripe more than compensated for his 4-of-11 shooting from the field. Seρor Clutch also scored 16 of his game-total of 22 points in the fourth quarter.
Ginobili is the most obvious manifestation of the Spurs' collective will-power and fierce competitive nature.
Poise was another dominating issue. The Spurs were certainly perturbed by the refs' malfeasance, but managed to temper their complaints. Meanwhile, the Jazz reacted to the same blown calls and non-calls by blowing their cool. The home team's lack of self-control cost them five technicals, plus the banishing of Fisher and Jerry Sloan the team's most veteran player and the league's most veteran coach.
The bottom line, however, is that the Jazz aren't ready to beat a team as offensively versatile, as defensively slick, and as championship-tested as the Spurs. Win or lose, playing with intensity in San Antonio in Game 5 will go a long way in the development of the Jazz.
But they're still at least a year away from competing on equal terms with San Antonio. To do so, they'll need another creative scorer and a more athletic big man than Okur.
Before learning how to win at this level, the Jazz will have to imbibe the only lesson available to them at this point. Learning how to lose with ferocity, with honor, and with grace.
Charley Rosen is FOXSports.com's NBA analyst and author of 13 books about hoops, the current one being "The pivotal season How the 1971-72 L.A. Lakers changed the NBA."
I haven't seen this article posted yet today.
Charley Rosen / FOXSports.com
Posted: 8 hours ago
The Spurs are in command of the Western Conference Finals after besting the Jazz 91-79 in a wild, slam-bang contest.
That's a far cry from Utah's blowout win in Game 3, and Monday's loss shows why the Jazz are still a far cry from elite.
First of all, it should be noted that Steve Javie, Ken Mauer, and Joe DeRosa had worse games than any of the players. For no discernible reasons, some flops were ignored, some were penalized, and some were rewarded. And because of the routine mayhem permitted to transpire in the middle, most of the players will no doubt be suffering from scratches, bumps and bruises from their elbows to their fingertips. Things got so chaotic that whenever a whistle sounded the players had no idea what the forthcoming call would be.
Here's an incident that showed exactly how confused the refs really were: The Spurs had the ball when a pass to the wing was clearly deflected out of bounds by Andrei Kirilenko but Mauer indicated that Bruce Bowen had touched the ball last and awarded possession to Utah. After a quick conference, however, the three refs determined that Bowen had not touched the ball and that it belonged to San Antonio.
OK. Well done.
But one of the refs was wearing a wire, and during their deliberation Mauer said, "Kirilenko deflected the ball, and I don't know if it went off Bowen or not."
Really? Then why did he make the bogus call in the first place?
The only positive outcome of the refs' collective incompetence is that it didn't particularly favor either team.
Sure, the Spurs shot 41 free throws to Utah's 20, but that's because Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili consistently drove the ball to the hole. Meanwhile, only Deron Williams did the same for the Jazz.
And with Fabricio Oberto's solid defense on Carlos Boozer, Utah's man in the middle was virtually reduced to being a jump shooter. As a result, Boozer shot zero free throws.
Though Williams continued to be practically unstoppable 11-of-21, 10 assists, 27 points he received little help from his teammates.
While Kirilenko threatened and blocked several shots coming to the ball from the weak-side, he shot decently (3-of-7) but threw away several critical passes in the fourth quarter.
As before, Mehmet Okur did a terrific job in defending Duncan, but still had trouble putting the ball into the hole in his own right 3-of-7, 7 points.
Derek Fisher, Paul Millsap, Gordan Giricek, and Matt Harpring shot a collective 6-of-16. And that was that.
With the game on the line, San Antonio forced Williams to go right, then tried to pin him along the baseline with rotating bigs. This tactic worked more times than it failed, and once Williams' offense was stifled, the Jazz faded in a hurry.
With an offense that was so oriented toward jump shooting, Utah's only chance to win the game was with its defense. And they took advantage of Duncan's habits in the post of dribbling too much without gaining much ground, and of dribbling with the ball too far away from his body. This enabled Okur, Fisher and Williams to attack Duncan's exposed handle with great success. Utah's relentless digging and sniping also revealed that Duncan is not an especially adept passer when he's in motion.
In fact, Duncan was so discombobulated that on one sequence he lost track of the shot clock and was caught dribbling the ball as the timer detonated. All in all, it was an embarrassing performance for the Big Fundamental.
Duncan did make an adjustment in the second half. When posted, he put the ball on the floor only once, then tucked the ball into his stomach as he turned and made contact with Okur. By getting into Okur's body, Duncan succeeded in limiting his defender's ability to reach out and touch the ball.
However, Duncan is only comfortable making these kinds of moves from the right box. From the left box, he winds up lurching to the baseline and tossing up out-of-control flippers. Instead of stepping back and forcing TD to finish from there, Okur was much too aggressive and bailed Duncan out several times with unnecessary fouls.
In addition to controlling Duncan (6-of-13 for 19 points), the Jazz also stymied Parker by converging on him whenever he carried the ball into the lane. As a result, Parker was 6-of-19 and tallied only 17 points. Still, Parker showed his toughness by refusing to back down. Like a Joe Palooka punching dummy that I once got for my birthday, Parker jumped back up every time he was knocked down.
In the end, though, it was Ginobili who was the deciding factor. Driving, scampering, rebounding, stealing and even dropping an occasional triple, Ginobili was simply relentless. His head-long penetrations forced the Jazz to foul him, hence his 12-of-15 from the stripe more than compensated for his 4-of-11 shooting from the field. Seρor Clutch also scored 16 of his game-total of 22 points in the fourth quarter.
Ginobili is the most obvious manifestation of the Spurs' collective will-power and fierce competitive nature.
Poise was another dominating issue. The Spurs were certainly perturbed by the refs' malfeasance, but managed to temper their complaints. Meanwhile, the Jazz reacted to the same blown calls and non-calls by blowing their cool. The home team's lack of self-control cost them five technicals, plus the banishing of Fisher and Jerry Sloan the team's most veteran player and the league's most veteran coach.
The bottom line, however, is that the Jazz aren't ready to beat a team as offensively versatile, as defensively slick, and as championship-tested as the Spurs. Win or lose, playing with intensity in San Antonio in Game 5 will go a long way in the development of the Jazz.
But they're still at least a year away from competing on equal terms with San Antonio. To do so, they'll need another creative scorer and a more athletic big man than Okur.
Before learning how to win at this level, the Jazz will have to imbibe the only lesson available to them at this point. Learning how to lose with ferocity, with honor, and with grace.
Charley Rosen is FOXSports.com's NBA analyst and author of 13 books about hoops, the current one being "The pivotal season How the 1971-72 L.A. Lakers changed the NBA."
I haven't seen this article posted yet today.