Monroe: Ginobili Covers Up Kobe

[duncan228]

Ginobili covers up Kobe
Mike Monroe

He had matched his season-high point production, nailed a 30-foot 3-point shot at the end of the third period and came closer to being the Manu Ginobili who was the Spurs' leading scorer last season than at any time since he returned to their lineup after off-season ankle surgery. But one defensive play underscored the difference that Ginobili makes for the Spurs when he is, well, Manu.

After Roger Mason Jr. gave the Spurs a 112-111 lead with 10.5 seconds left, Ginobili made up his mind that if the Lakers were going to beat the Spurs, Kobe Bryant would not be the player to do it.

Aggressively double-teaming Bryant along the left sideline, Ginobili forced Bryant to give up the ball to teammate Trevor Ariza with 3 seconds left. Hurrying his drive to the basket, Ariza was whistled for traveling by referee Sean Corbin with eight-tenths of a second remaining, securing an important victory for the Spurs.

“We know the kind of player (Kobe) is,” Ginobili said. “He was running those pick-and-rolls and picking us apart, with those guys hitting jumpers.

“I just decided to go and blitz him and make somebody else win the game.”

Any one Laker is a better choice than Bryant, whose3-pointer with 12.9 seconds left had given the Lakers a 111-109 lead.

Ariza, it turned out, was a much better choice for the Spurs.

“It worked out pretty well,” Ginobili said. “You have to do it down the stretch with (Bryant). He is such a talent and makes every tough shot look so easy, so that's what I decided to do.”

Before getting to the point that he needed to help the Spurs win with a defensive decision, Ginobili had put them in position for the victory with his most aggressive game of the season. He got his offense rolling by stripping the ball from Bryant to start an end-to-end drive for a dunk.

Ginobili scored 15 points in the second period alone, making 3 of 5 3-point shots.

“I was aggressive,” Ginobili said. “I was feeling good. It helped that I could make the first couple shots to get me going.

“And the fact of playing a team like the Lakers helped me. We all know they had the best record last season, so it made me feel good, and I used it.”

Spurs coach Gregg Popovich has seen the incremental return of Ginobili's explosiveness over the past couple of weeks, convinced his prized sixth man is approaching 100 percent.

Wednesday's effort was another confirmation that Ginobili is nearly back to being himself.

“Manu looked real explosive; real healthy,” Popovich said. “He had his quickness. For us, that's mandatory. For us to be a heck of a team he's got to be totally healthy.”

[timvp]

Wednesday's effort was another confirmation that Ginobili is nearly back to being himself.

“Manu looked real explosive; real healthy,” Popovich said. “He had his quickness. For us, that's mandatory. For us to be a heck of a team he's got to be totally healthy.”

I liked his quickness and straight ahead explosiveness but his elevation on that dunk . . . wasn't exactly James White-esque. I'm not sure he could have jumped any lower and still dunked it.

Hopefully Ginobili's vertical leaping ability returns as he gets in better shape.

[EricB]

Yeah that dunk bothered me a bit, but his and 1 layups were vintage Ginobili to the core.

[TMTTRIO]

I'm still very concerned with Manu. Manu had an awesome game against the Lakers(of course Manu even said he was very motivated for that game)but he really hasn't had any other really good games. He hasn't even really had a group of games where he played really well. Even last year with his ankle injury he had a game or two where he would go off and score thirty points so I don't think that game really showed us much. I just hope he starts getting it together. Well at least now we have Mason to take off a lot of pressure.