We shut down Lebron, why not West?

[SnakeBoy]

James is a one man show so it's easier to focus on him. Spurs are doing fine defensively. It's when the offense goes completely MIA that things really break down. Hornets get to speed up the game off of all those misses.

[naico]

LeBron can't shoot.

[Capt Bringdown]

i can't understand how a guy who averaged 24 and 14 against a front-line of Amare & Shaq is so stymied by Chandler and Ely.

I think Chandler and Ely are in Tim's head, sad to say.
This could have been one of those leadership moments for Tim tonight, but he blew it.
All we can do at this point is hope he can put 2 good games together against these guys.

Otherwise, we're done. It's that simple.

[Spurs da champs]

Its a lot different the hornets have so many threats compared to the one man team. And plus the refs call a lot of bull **** calls.

[stepmonkey]

LeBron can't shoot.

Bingo. West has a midrange jump shot. Spurs' defense has always been predicated on stopping the drive and contesting the 3 ball.

[Obstructed_View]

LeBron can't shoot.

[ballhog]

West has played well at home. That's it. They could shut him down but someone else would go off. He was feeling it last night.

[GrandeDavid]

Lebron doesn't have any sidekicks. West has Paul. Pick your poison.

[2Cleva]

You mean Paul has West.

West is the sidekick - Paul makes the show go. It goes to show what a consistent 2-man attack can do. Just like Parker's ability to get in the lane is primarily due to the defending big men so worried about Duncan that they aren't ready to help.

[Cry Havoc]

Bull , get off Duncan will you, as a team we sucked tonight.

Duncan is our leader.

When a team sucks, it's on the leader's shoulders. No matter what else happens.

Duncan was atrocious tonight on the offensive end.

[FoxMulder]

The Spurs doesn´t have any player who can play deffense on West as simple as that.
Duncan never play a good deffense with PF with mid-range shoot.

[SAGambler]

This was one of those games where offense trumps defense and the Spurs had almost zero offense for the 3rd quarter. Seems to be an annoying habit they have gotten into.

[cjjr72984]

Because 5>1? Discuss?

That's the answer right there. Not to mention, West has a bitter mid-range jumper.

[stretch]

no really, how did we stop lebron last year? everyone's saying that west is a bad matchup for the spurs, but he and lebron are the same size, and lebron's faster and has more range, so why could we stop lebron and not west?

Because the whole team had to stop Lebron. It wasn't Bowen on his own by any means whatsoever. Every time he drove, they were doubling and tripling Lebron. Plus, West has a better midrange jumper than Lebron, which helps stretch defenses a lot more. Lebron still has not developed his jumper quite yet. When he does... there will be absolutely no stopping the guy.