[ad_1]
The Spurs' offensive was just enough to clinch victory in their first game of the Saturday night series against the Nuggets. Despite playing on the road against the league's best home team this season, the Spurs collected 109.8 points for 100 possessions. It is well below their season average of 112.0 outside of San Antonio, but also much better than the 106.6 allowed by the Nuggets in Denver.
They did it despite the bad shooting nights of DeMar DeRozan and LaMarcus Aldridge, relying instead on the effective score of almost every other player in the formation. Except for those two and Marco Belinelli, each Spur who made a shot scored more than 1.3 points per attempt.
These contributions were the key to victory in this regard, but they were not caused by a change of approach. The Spurs know who they are and do not move for anyone. Unlike the Nuggets, whose best player won the team's fourth-most attempts, the Spurs drove DeMar and LaMarcus throughout the match.
The clearest example is the team's unwavering commitment to the position. They ran or tried to run after 28 possessions, nearly a third of their chances on a half court.
LaMarcus led the way, with 14 post games, and DeMar used almost everything else, with 12. For the most part, the Nuggets chose to play each one of them directly no matter who kept them. They sent double teams to LaMarcus five times, which took the ball away.
The Spurs were able to find places available in these double teams, especially on the line of free throws, but they struggled to capitalize. Although Derrick White and Bryn Forbes made two difficult shots at the end of two of these games, the tactics generally proved favorable to the Nuggets.
Apart from these five possessions, the Nuggets remained loyal to a more conservative defense, collapsing to keep DeMar and LaMarcus off the edge and trusting their defenders to make only one. .
It worked. The two combined teams only took four rim attempts, by PBPstats, all of LaMarcus, after a slightly higher average of nine per game between the two teams in the regular season.
In total, the Spurs scored only 24 points on possessions including one position and 5 fouls, with only one turnover. That's not good, but the Nuggets' commitment to limit the Spurs to the pole position has opened up opportunities for other players.
The staging of Jakob Poelt's alleys was the first of Rudy Gay's two poles.
Finally, DeMar put three extra points at the disposal of Spurs to give him a lead of 6 points within 5 minutes of the back.
Post-ups also have other effects. They generally slow down the game and the Spurs have a much better chance of keeping a match in the half-court. Fighting LaMarcus to get a position several times could certainly deplete the Nuggets' best player, while managing DeMar's bas-relief bag could get the Spurs into the bonus, which he almost accomplished on his own at the start of the game. 4th quarter.
Both could afford to be a little more aggressive to get to the rim, although this obviously accompanies an increased risk of rollover, which the Spurs generally avoid at all costs. But this would also increase the chances of usability of baskets and the possibility of attracting more help and more mistakes, which should help to overcome the danger, especially since both of these players have been low-turnover players throughout their career.
This does not mean that the Spurs should continue to rely on such a large amount of post, but this approach has some advantages. Given that the Nuggets are well equipped to protect DeMar and LaMarcus from several competent defenders, it might be wise to diversify a bit.
Giving a little more of these opportunities to Rudy would probably yield dividends. He scored only twice in this game and did not shoot any shots. During the season, however, he shot a higher percentage of the post than DeMar or LaMarcus, and there will be more imbalances on the floor for him at some point in this series than for one or the other. Other two stars of the team. .
This would probably require some time for Rudy to be on the ground without DeMar and with only one from LaMarcus or Jakob for reasons of spacing, but it might be worth it. The Nuggets will probably not miss so many shots in this series, and the Spurs will likely have to make small changes if they want to keep up.
[ad_2]
Source link