San Antonio Spurs

[tackielarla]

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Post Game Quotes (Spurs-Mavs Game Two)

Head Coach Gregg Popovich

On tonight’s game against Dallas - The difference in the game was the boards. We did a better job on the boards and didn’t give up 21 points in second chance points, put backs, etc. Tonight we did a better job at that and it helped us both on the defensive end and pushing the basketball back the other way.

On the play of Tony Parker - He was aggressive, both going to the hole and shooting the jump shot and that always makes us a better team. That is standard for any team. If you are being aggressive offensively it helps your teammates. He did a good job at staying aggressive and keeping it that way. He was very focused the whole way.

On Matt Bonner - Matt is a hustle type guy. He will do his best to get open and he works hard on the boards. But it’s also important for everyone to play well. He spreads the court well for us. That’s the important part of what he does for us.

On the Dallas response to tonight’s loss - One would hope that you would come back from a loss with aggression and determination. I think all teams that are in the playoffs do that. Dallas will come back very dedicated and come back hard on Thursday. But they did their job. They came here and won a game and did what they wanted to do.

On Drew Gooden’s fall - It was an odd fall, but it was no one’s fault. He was spitting up blood so they checked him out. I am not sure what is going on to be honest with you.

On the difference between tonight and last game’s finish - It’s never one thing. We continued to make shots and score and we didn’t do that in the first game because we had a dry spell. We played better defense, got rebounds and didn’t give up second chance points. In Game One they had everything going for them in that aspect – but that’s basketball.

Roger Mason Jr

On the win - We played well. I think defensively, our focus from the start of the game was key. Obviously, Tony (Parker) was outstanding. He was just leading us and making shots and that’s the way we need to play.

On not allowing their bench to have a big game - We were desperate tonight. We had a great start last game and we let them come back. Tonight we said, even if we’re up 20 or 15 we’re going to keep playing. We did that and they’re going to score points but we want to make it tough on them.

On hedging on their pick-and-rolls - We wanted to make them uncomfortable. Last game, we let (Jose) Barea have too much space and he hurt us. I think tonight we focused in on it. Tim (Duncan) and the big guys did a great job on hedging out and we were able to contest their shots.

I was in Matt’s ear at every timeout. He’s one of the best shooters in the league and we need that. We need him to be super aggressive and tonight he did that.

Tim Duncan

On the win - We talked about sustaining and obviously we had a great start to the game and got out to a lead and understood that in the third and fourth quarter last game we let off the gas. We wanted to stay solid and I think we did a good job of that, playing for all 48 minutes.

On the turnaround from Game 1 - Better bounces for us. A little more focus on knowing what they want to do and trying to clean up some of their stuff. I thought we did a better defensive job of contesting shots and we blocked a couple shots and kept it off the glass.

On the affect Matt Bonner’s threes had on the team - He was great for us. He did a much better job of moving and finding the open spot and making them respect that. We’re going to continue to work for that and when TP (Tony Parker) is playing the way he is those guys are going to be wide open all over the floor.

On playing a great all-around game - Defensively and offensively and even when they made a run and got the lead to under 10, we didn’t panic. We went back to what we were doing and pushed it back up.

Head Coach Rick Carlisle

Opening Statement - It was a disappointing game from our perspective. San Antonio really brought up their level of aggression I thought, [especially] at the defensive end. They were very good offensively. We’re going to have to do better at both ends ourselves. The first and third quarters were our undoing. We just got off to a bad start. In the third we got it down to nine and then they got it up to 16 or 17. We just couldn’t get a handle on the game at that point. We’ve got to regroup and we’ve got to do a lot of things better.

On the bench not being as effective as in Game 1 - Our whole team wasn’t as effective. I wouldn’t point to the bench, we just struggled. I thought it was their aggressive posture that had more to do with it than anything. We’re going to have to, as I said, be better at both ends. I thought we were playing hard, it’s just that they were really, super aggressive.

On Bowen neutralizing J.J. Barea - We’re going to have to just play better overall. We gave up 39% 3-point shooting and 53% from the floor. You could talk about individual matchups, but overall our team is going to have to play better defensively. That will help our offense. We’re going to have to put the ball in the whole when we have the opportunities. Bowen’s a guy they’re going to put on either the best perimeter player or the guy that’s causing a problem at any time. He does a great job and we’re just going to have to do better.

On being content with a split coming into the game - I didn’t think so. I thought we were playing hard and they just took it to another level tonight. That was the difference. We were never able to meet their level of intensity and it wasn’t that we weren’t playing hard. They just ramped it up higher.

On the Spurs’ focus on shutting down Nowitski - Again I think we’re going to have to be better defensively. We’re always going to get better shots and be able to get our better players stops when we’re getting stops on defense. It’s much harder when you’re taking the ball out of the other team’s basket. Look, we’re going to have to work to get Dirk and Jet more look. They’re obviously a priority defensively for them. That’s going to be on the coaching staff to do. We’re going to have to do that in the next couple of days obviously.

On stopping a team that is as hot as the Spurs were tonight - You’re got to be better with your coverages. I think when we go look at the film we’re going to find that there are areas that we can approve on, obviously. It’s tough with a guy like Parker with great quickness. He’s just a difficult guy to deal with, but it’s a five-man responsibility. We’re going to have to keep throwing a bunch of different guys at him, but he’s tough. We’re going to have to do better.

Jason Terry

On the game - We need to stay positive and up beat. We are ready to get home for Gm3. The Spurs did exactly what they needed to do tonight. Tonight was a must win for the Spurs. Were going back to Dallas in a similar situation, we need to win game 3. You have to give the Spurs all the credit tonight because they out worked us on both ends of the court.

The Spurs keyed on both Dirk and me during game 1 and game 2 the only difference was our lack of execution tonight. You have to take you hat off to Tony Parker he played well and really stepped up for his team. When you give up 23 first quarter points that’s just unacceptable, we need to adjust our game plan and really hone on Tony during game 3. Tony is the head of the snake and we need to make someone else beat us to have a chance.

The Spurs were keyed in tonight. They didn’t allow our guys to make the easy baskets and we expected that from them. The Spurs are champions for a reason, now its time for us to go home and put forth a good effort Thursday night.

The series is tired one to one and that’s as positive as we could have expected coming into San Antonio, if you lose by one or thirty its still one game, now its time for us to dust off and get after it.

Jose Barea

On the game - The Spurs came out on fire tonight. We tried what we could but the Spurs weren’t losing. They made the necessary adjustments and played great basketball.

The Spurs killed us on every end of the court. We need to go home and have a couple of good practices and get ready for Thursday.

[istoryansucks]

great offense wins game but great defense win a championship..keep up the good work bowen para mag abot mo ni kobe.trakielarla team work kaayo imung team ganiha.nakita na ko ilang determination to win the game.

[aykiman]

nice !!!!!

[tackielarla]

Time to consider time
Jon Carroll
San Francisco Chronicle

"The clock is your friend." - Tim Duncan

Tim Duncan is a professional basketball player. He plays for the San Antonio Spurs. He has been voted to 11 all-star teams, 11 all-NBA teams and 11 all-defensive teams. His team has won the NBA championship four times. It probably won't win this year - key injuries, although not to Duncan - but the playoffs just started this weekend. As I've remarked before, you never know.

What is most notable about Duncan, though, is his almost preternatural calm. His face rarely changes expression. He accepts the bad breaks and the lucky bounces without histrionics. Some people have complained that he's boring to watch play, but those people have not focused on him for an entire game. He may have the face of a Zen master, but he has the elbows of a street fighter.

And the clock is his friend.

For a lot of us - probably for most of us - the clock is not our friend. We have a deadline. We don't know what to do. Suddenly the clock speeds up in that way that clocks have. Only an hour left. What we have at the moment is absolute garbage. The clock is not our friend.

The clock is Tim Duncan's friend. Soon the game will be over. Maybe it's a close game. Maybe he will make the game-winning shot. And maybe he won't. Maybe his shot will clatter off the back rim. But see, here's the thing: The clock is still his friend. He ran out of time and he lost, but that did not change his relationship with the clock.

(I may be projecting a little bit here. I will acknowledge that you may think that. I actually don't believe that I'm projecting, but I don't want y'all to think I've gone around the bend. Although here, around the bend: better scenery.)

And there are times when the clock does not move at all. There's a wonderful cartoon in the April 20 issue of the New Yorker. It shows Albert Einstein sitting in the waiting room at an airport. He has his suitcase beside him. He is alone in a row of chairs. His shoulders are slumped. The caption: "Einstein discovers that time can stop completely."

You've been there. I've been there. The clock is not our friend. The hands of the clock do not change position. We've entered the waiting room wormhole, where our relative motion is zero. Our actual motion is zero. Our brains are empty, echoing rooms. Maybe we have a laptop, but come on - a laptop! How often do you get to experience a rift in the space-time continuum?

Besides, a laptop almost always brings bad news. This is its function. Do you need to be becalmed at O'Hare and hear that your company is considering more layoffs? I'd say: probably not.

But Tim Duncan is visualizing. It's six minutes to go in the fourth quarter, and his team is ahead by a dozen. That seems comfortable, but Duncan knows that comfort is a chump's game. The clock is his friend. He knows that if he works really hard, he can build the lead to 20 with four minutes to go, and then the Spurs will have achieved, as the announcers say, separation.

Duncan has achieved a detente with time. It doesn't matter what the clock says because the clock is always presenting an opportunity. Maybe you need to slow down; maybe you need to speed up. The clock will tell you what you need to do. Why? Because it is your friend.

Most of us can't live like that. We are governed by the clock, or we have decided not to be governed by the clock. Either way, it's not our friend. But if you really, truly want to live in the moment, the clock has to be your friend. The clock defines the moment - admittedly in a sort of arbitrary system based on the sun, but with unnatural elements like 60 minutes in an hour (why 60?) and 60 seconds (again) in a minute, but ultimately in tune with the cosmos except for that leap year thing.

But if the clock is your friend, you have accepted everything about the measurement of time. You've even accepted leap year. When Tim Duncan plays on Feb. 29, he tries just as hard as on the other days. So I am asking you, in the spirit of peace and harmony in these difficult times - be like Tim. Embrace the clock. Not literally, of course.

The clock is indeed your friend.

As long as a basketball player is your role model, you really can't go wrong - except for those guys who spend a lot of time in the parking lots of strip clubs.

[juan penduko]

up tani b. layu.a nagud ani

[o_bama]

post lang ta bisag walay hinug dan just like the person above..

[o_bama]

Dude, I meant personal attacks to the posters and NOT about the game. The Mavs will still choke this series! They HAD to win Game 1 else it wouldn't be called a choke-job!

Maayo nuon brad nga nag bagong buhay naka,but ma boring nasad ni ang forum, atleast naay chalenge si Penduko classless man gud.

[tackielarla]

Maayo nuon brad nga nag bagong buhay naka,but ma boring nasad ni ang forum, atleast naay chalenge si Penduko classless man gud.

Ahahaha! I'm just feeling a bit on the lighter side of things lately.

Kabantay bitaw ko mejo namingaw gamay ang board (hehehe); I'm sure you can think of something (hehehe). Naa pa bitaw penduko who'll carry the torch in my behalf.

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Mavs: Parker, look out
Jeff McDonald

For the better part of four quarters Monday, Dallas coach Rick Carlisle tried everything he could to pre-empt the Tony Parker Show.

He ran a conga line of defenders at Parker, trying to slow the one-man parade to the basket. He dialed up every number in his defensive Rolodex, even sending a zone Parker's way during one stretch.

The result: Parker had a 38-point field day anyway, and the Spurs evened their first-round series at a game apiece with a 105-84 victory.

As the festivities move to Dallas for Game 3, Mavericks center Erick Dampier believes he has the solution to his team's growing Parker problem.

“Every time he drives the lane, we have to put him on his back,” Dampier told the Dallas Morning News. “The first foul has to tell him he's in for a long night. My first foul Thursday night is going to put him on his back. I guarantee it.”

As far as playoff guarantors go, Dampier isn't exactly Joe Namath.

By announcing his intentions, Dampier may have painted a scarlet target on his back. An NBA official said Tuesday that Dampier's comments were “under review,” and that the league will be watching to see if he makes good on his called shot. The review could result in a fine for Dampier.

The Mavericks wouldn't be the first team to employ such a black-and-blue strategy against the Spurs' blur of a point guard. Unofficially, Parker leads the league in floor burns.

It wouldn't even be the first hard foul Parker has absorbed in the series. In Game 2, Jason Terry took him down with a shot that referees ruled a Flagrant 1.

“I'm used to it,” said Parker, the Spurs' leading scorer. “It's no different for me. I'm still going to try to penetrate and be aggressive. I'll definitely be on the ground, but I'm going to get up.”

By hook or by crook — or by hip-check or well-placed elbow — finding a way to control Parker will be the Mavs' priority as they aim to reassume command of the series.

Parker took over Game 2, using every weapon in his arsenal to make 16 of 22 field goals. He finished just three shy of his career playoff high of 41 points, set in the first round last year against Phoenix.

Parker scored 19 points in the first quarter, 27 in the first half, and probably could have made it to 50 had the Spurs needed him to.

“He did a good job of staying aggressive and keeping it that way,” Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. “He didn't drift. He didn't lose focus.”

In that, Parker was just picking up where he left off.

Parker averaged a career-high 22 points during the regular season, the most for a Spurs player since Tim Duncan scored 22.3 in 2003-04. In franchise history, only George Gervin enjoyed a more prolific season at guard.

Asked to shoulder a bigger load with Duncan and Manu Ginobili battling injuries throughout the regular season, Parker led the Spurs in scoring 40 times, including in 23 of the final 27 games.

From Feb. 24 to March 20, Parker was the Spurs' scoring leader in 14 consecutive contests, the longest streak since Duncan accomplished it in 19 straight in 2002.

“He's been consistently great,” Duncan said.

Save for a fourth-quarter lockdown at the hands of J.J. Barea in Game 1 that in retrospect seems like a fluke, Parker's postseason is shaping up to be as dazzling as his regular season. Even in the Spurs' loss, he scored 24 points.

With Game 3 looming, the Mavericks go back to the drawing board, with Parker in their crosshairs. There aren't many options left that won't draw the ire of the league.

“He's a difficult guy to deal with,” Carlisle said. “It's a five-man responsibility. We're going to have to keep throwing a bunch of different guys at him, but he's tough.”

If Dampier backs up his words with deed, Parker will get a chance to show just how tough.

[juan penduko]

Maayo nuon brad nga nag bagong buhay naka,but ma boring nasad ni ang forum, atleast naay chalenge si Penduko classless man gud.

wow. classless? ayay nangusi napud kang bayota ka ha. looking for trouble youve come to the right place.

[juan penduko]

Maayo nuon brad nga nag bagong buhay naka,but ma boring nasad ni ang forum, atleast naay chalenge si Penduko classless man gud.

ayaw pa pansin brad. KABALO KO GUSTO LANG KA PA HISGUT..