 |  |
With the San Antonio Spurs in the midst of an uncharacteristic late-season losing streak last week, a reporter suggested to coach Gregg Popovich that his players appeared to be dazed while sitting on the bench. "That's just horse(bleep)," Popovich said. "It's the same guys that have been here 12 years. They have that same look whether they win or lose, win a championship or lose a championship. Because we lose more doesn't mean that same look is daze. We look the same way when we win.
|
|
| You can always count on the Spurs making a mad dash in the postseason. (Getty Images) |
Right now, the Spurs are sitting in the middle of the muddled Western Conference playoff picture and it's difficult to tell whether the defending champions are serious contenders to repeat or an aging group whose best days might be behind them.
In years past, including some of the championship years, the Spurs had some rough patches, but they always seemed to hit their peak in the second half of the season.
That appeared to be the case earlier this month when the Spurs ran off 11 straight wins, but then they dropped six of seven, including four straight. Although the Spurs will take a three-game winning streak into Tuesday night's game at Orlando, those wins came against a pair of sub-.500 teams (Chicago and Sacramento) and a struggling Dallas Mavericks team that played without star forward Dirk Nowitzki in the fourth quarter.
"We were doing pretty good at the beginning of the season, but then we've had too many up and downs," guard Manu Ginobili said. "We're trying to find a way. We have a month [before the playoffs begin] and, hopefully, we click at the right time.
"But right now, we're not there."
Ginobili believes the Spurs' winning streak a few weeks ago was a bit of a mirage.
"We've had some wins, but I'm not so sure that we were playing that good, at a playoff level," he said. "We won too many games on a last-second shot that we shouldn't have won like that. We should have taken care of business before. I don't think we were so good then, we're not so bad now."
Even though the Spurs are tied for fifth place in the West and, barring upsets, wouldn't have home-court advantage in any round of the playoffs, everyone is confident they can get back to the Finals -- regardless of home court -- if they start playing up to their capabilities.
"Of course, it's important and I would prefer to play games at home all the time, especially in the Finals," Ginobili said. "But it doesn't mean anything if you get the No. 1 [seed]. You just have to play well when it counts. We've won Game 7s, we've lost Game 7s, it's a matter of playing well when it counts."
Home court usually is a huge factor in the NBA playoffs, but the race out West has been bucking trends all season.
"It might be a tougher route, more games might have to be played, but you'd make a pretty good bet if you said the [team] that's seeded first in the West won't come out of the West," Popovich said. "That would be a decent bet because the eighth seed could be as good as the first.
That's no exaggeration.
"None of us is any better than any other, so the seeds are really irrelevant this season more than any other time."
So instead of focusing on securing home court, San Antonio is concentrating on elevating its level of play. Ginobili, who leads the team in scoring, stepped up when others were sidelined by injuries, but the Spurs know they are at their best when power forward Tim Duncan and point guard Tony Parker are the top two options on offense.
Parker is rounding into form after missing 13 games because of injuries, while Duncan says he is looking to be more aggressive.
"I'm trying to make the right moves and the right plays in the right spot," Duncan said. "If that means being aggressive and taking a couple of extra shots, that's what I have to do."
How well the Spurs do in the remainder of the regular season probably will provide some insight into whether they are capable of repeating.
Of their 12 remaining games, half are against teams currently in the top eight in the West.
"The good thing is we have a lot of good teams, a lot of playoff teams (on the schedule)," Duncan said. "It'll be a good test for us and we'll be ready to go when the playoffs start."
That's exactly what the folks at the TV networks -- and perhaps even some at the NBA office -- don't want to hear. With the Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Lakers suddenly reemerging as legitimate title contenders, the hope is that this year's Finals will be a matchup of sexier teams capable of bringing in more casual fans.
The Spurs, winners of four titles in the previous nine years, would like to crash the party yet again.
"We have to just play good at the right moments, and the right moment is the playoffs," Parker said. "We had a good winning streak and then we had some games that could have gone either way.
"As long as we stay healthy, when the playoffs start I like our chances."
John Jackson is the NBA columnist for the Chicago-Sun-Times.