Can Spurs' pre-break boost last?
Jeff McDonald

Three minutes into the third quarter of their latest potential season-changing victory at Denver, the Spurs found themselves watching a horror movie they'd already seen before.

The Nuggets had whittled a 14-point deficit to four, energizing their home crowd and sucking all of the air out of the Spurs' huddle. It was the same pattern that, over the past month, had resulted in punch-in-the-gut losses to Dallas, Portland, Houston, Chicago and even these same Nuggets.

Then, Gregg Popovich called timeout and sent the script in for a rewrite.

“You're on the road, and good teams make runs,” Popovich told his team. “This is where mental toughness comes in. We'll see if we can hang in there.”

Moments later, Roger Mason Jr. hit Richard Jefferson on a lob for an easy basket, Jefferson buried a corner 3-pointer, and the Spurs were off on a 16-6 run and on the way to a stunning 111-92 victory Thursday that, for the time being, seems to have pulled their season back from the brink.

“That was the ballgame right there,” Popovich said, “where we stood our ground.”

Whether that stand becomes the turning point in the Spurs' win-some, lose-some season remains to be seen.

The Spurs have come to this corner before, and failed to turn it. They have celebrated the prospect of putting it all together, only to have it fall to pieces again.

All the Spurs know is this: At least they're headed into the All-Star break on a high note, which beats the alternative.

“This was a good win for us going into the break,” said forward Tim Duncan, the Spurs' lone participant in Sunday's All-Star Game in Arlington. “Hopefully, it helps our confidence. Hopefully, it helps get us on a roll.”

With the victory in Denver, against a Nuggets team playing better than anyone in the Western Conference, the Spurs have set themselves up for a successful ending to their annual rodeo trip.

Already 3-2 on the sojourn, the Spurs emerge from the break with three games against sub-.500 teams — Indiana, Philadelphia and Detroit. A four-game winning streak, which would be the Spurs' second-longest of the season, is not just a possibility, but a probability.

The Spurs are 30-21, a tad off their typical 50-win pace, and in fifth place in a tightly bunched West. They are just a 11/2 games behind Dallas for fourth, two games behind Utah for third and four behind Denver for second.

If the Spurs do make a run coming out of the All-Star break, Thursday night in Denver will be remembered as the springboard.

“Going into the break, you always remember your last game,” Mason said. “There are less than 30 games left to get in gear. This lets us know how good we can be.”

The Spurs team that blasted the Nuggets — defensive-minded, accurate from 3-point range, able to make plays when the game was in jeopardy — was the team Popovich had envisioned coming out of training camp. It was the team he had seen too little of throughout the season's first 50 games.

“I've seen signs all along,” Popovich said. “Usually we play better for more of the 48 minutes. We've been much more inconsistent than we have been in the past. Hopefully, this will be a good start to the second half.”

Still, the Spurs are aware that one victory, no matter how pleasing, does not a turnaround make.

Maybe the All-Star break throws the Spurs off what little groove they've built. Maybe they head to Indiana on Wednesday and lose to a moribund Pacers team that came within two points of winning at the AT&T Center in December. Maybe this resurrection turns out to be a mirage, too.

The Spurs tried hard not to panic when the season seemed at its darkest point. They will try hard not to relax now that there appears to be light at the end of the tunnel.

“You can't get too high on it; you can't get too low on it,” Duncan said. “You need more than one win to believe you've turned the corner.”