San Antonio Spurs 112, Utah Jazz 105: The Spurs survive the Jazz latest comeback
Without getting too far into the great point guard debate, or announcing a winner, I will say that there is no point guard in the NBA who is more of a potential handful in the fourth quarter than Deron Williams of the Utah Jazz.
There are just so many more weapons at Williams’ disposal as a scorer than the rest of his peers. Off the dribble with arguably the NBA’s most effective crossover, pull-up jumpers, off-the-ball cuts, in the post. The ways in which Williams carved up Tony Parker or George Hill for his 17 fourth quarter points are too numerous to list, but this is a man who once did this to Bruce Bowen when Bowen was still near the top of his game.
Watching Williams operate in the fourth quarter, it’s easy to see how Utah has authored so many thrilling comeback victories this season. Unfortunately for Jazz fans, the reason they’ve had to-and why they’ve now lost six in a row after the Spurs 112-105 victory-was even more obvious after watching Al Jefferson and Paul Millsap defend in the first half.
In the past, whatever the Jazz lacked in fleet-footed perimeter stoppers they made up for with physical play-foul enough times and eventually the refs will have to stop calling them, right? Well, the Jazz are still fouling at normal Jerry Sloan levels, briefly making Gary Neal (13 points, 6-7 free throws) look like Manu Ginobili in his ability to get to the line.
But this season the Jazz are compounding their foul troubles with poor back line help. Too often Utah’s guards attempted to fight over screens only to watch as Jefferson or Millsap refused to hedge or stop penetration from any member of the San Antonio Spurs backcourt.
The combination of Parker, Ginobili, Hill, and Neal accounted for 72 of the Spurs 112 points, mostly on a variety of floaters and layups in the paint. And the times the Jazz front line did hedge, there was little effort to recover to their man to box out or prevent an easy pass for a layup. For all the troubles Williams presented, the Spurs merely needed to be patient enough on offense to find their open shot.
That, and a complete lack of three-point shooting, is how you win a game even as the opponent shoots a staggering 54% from the field.
- Again, Chris Paul may run the pick and roll better, Rajon Rondo might be the better passer and defender, and Derrick Rose the better athlete, but do any of those players have the all-around offensive game Williams possesses?
Through the fourth quarter we saw Williams post Parker and Hill, rub them off screens Rip Hamilton style, break off a few crossovers for pull-up jumpers, and get to the basket with relative ease. - Watching Al Jefferson work, I couldn’t help but notice what might have deteriorated most in Tim Duncan’s post game: The ability to make a hard drive and from full speed, stop, gather, and loft a soft shot over the top of the defender. While the footwork is still there, and the first step still okay, this fluidity comes and goes on any given night at this point in Duncan’s career.
- It was good to see Ginobili, who has struggled with his outside shot as of late, be able to put his head down and get the basket. Most impressively using his long strides to get a layup just over the outstretched arms of Andrei Kirilenko.
- Finally, while Richard Jefferson has had some tough games recently, it would be hard not to mention his big three-pointer to help hold the Jazz off. Jefferson scored 14 points on 6-12 shooting.
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