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If Duncan is healthy, the Mavs are ed.
Spurs’ three keys to victory
Express-News
1. Who’s got Dirk?
No player in the Western Conference — not even that Kobe guy — has been as red-hot as Dirk Nowitzki during the final month of the regular season. Which Spurs player will draw the black bean defensive assignment? Tim Duncan, Kurt Thomas, Drew Gooden, Bruce Bowen, Ime Udoka and, yes, even Matt Bonner will probably all get a turn. Look for the Spurs to throw the kitchen sink at Nowitzki to try and keep him off his rhythm.
2. Tame the transition
Dallas doesn’t run quite the way, say, the “Seven Seconds or Less” Suns used to, but with Jason Kidd running the show, the Mavs still get quite a bit of their offense in transition. The bulk of Dallas’ transition points don’t come at the rim but on jump shots — and often by finding a certain 7-foot German trailing the play. It will be important for each Spurs player to quickly identify who he is supposed to pick up on the break, and do it — quickly.
3. Let Duncan be Duncan
When these two teams met in the 2006 playoffs, Duncan averaged 32.3 points and 11.7 rebounds in the seven-game epic. The Mavericks’ frontline has actually gotten lighter since then, with the departure of shot-blocker DeSagana Diop. Duncan is three years older and has been battling knee pain for the past two months, but if he can muster something close to his season average (19.3 points, 10.7 rebounds), the Spurs will be in good shape.
- Jeff McDonald
If Duncan is healthy, the Mavs are ed.
This is some very deep analysis by someone who's supposed to be the spurs beat writer. Did he write this in the toilet when suddenly the phone rang? Or maybe he was burnin his chef boyardee?
Timvp at least takes time out to give his analysis some thought and puts a thorough piece together. **Oxymoron alert** This is completely half-azz'd.
Looks like Dampier's play is going to be key.. if he gets into foul trouble early, who will the Mavs have to relieve him.. Timmy should have some success against him.
He's just a Spur's fan caught up in Spur's fever, but he's gotta get in line and stand there like everyone else.....
Not really. Remember in 06 Duncan was healthy and avg 31 & 10 and it still wasn't quite enough.
Even if Duncan is healthy he won't avg 30 & 10 this year. The key for the Spurs is Parker and for Dallas the health of Josh Howard.
no one on the mavs team can stop parker. the mavs will collapse the paint. that's the only hope they have against tp. if parker can find his shooters at the three, and they can hit, game over. spurs take game one.
Just to keep things straight:
Duncan wasn't healthy in '06. He played with Planter Fasciitis the entire '05-'06 season.
No mention of The Jet???
His play is gonna be the key to the series... unforunatly for us his game seems to find another level against the Spurs... but the good thing is, he has to go off like that for Dallas to stay in the game with us. Even if he goes off, we'll still have a chance, it's not gonna work the other way around.
3 keys
Punish Dirk
Let tony shine
Contain Terry
There's no real journalist in SA that wants his job?
Come on I can find 20 ST posters that would write much better than those tasteless articles.
I'll take his job without pay. I just need relocation to San Antonio.
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