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 2009-03-24 21:22  #1
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Popovich calmly keeps Spurs pointed toward the big prize



Popovich calmly keeps Spurs pointed toward the big prize


By Fran Blinebury, for NBA.com
Posted Mar 20 2009 3:36PM

If you're ever on an airplane that has to make an unexpected landing in the Hudson, and Capt. Sully isn't at the controls, it wouldn't hurt to have a few San Antonio Spurs in the cockpit. The Spurs are unflappable, calmer than a yoga class on sedatives. If the Spurs were a mixed drink, they'd be the opposite of a James Bond martini: stirred, not shaken.

So the four-times-in-the-past-decade champs let one get away to the lowly Oklahoma City Thunder on Monday night, and the skies didn't rumble. Nothing did. "We let one slip away," Tim Duncan said simply.

What never slips in San Antonio is the Spurs' overall focus and their attention to the prize that is the playoffs. Which is why head coach Gregg Popovich could come right back the very next night after that Thunder toe-stub and hold Duncan out of the lineup in an effort to get him rested and right with the postseason barely a month away.

While everyone else in the tightly packed Western Conference seems to be frantically scrambling for playoff seeding or home-court advantage or something, the Spurs --- currently No. 2 --- merely try to move one more step ahead.

"Maybe it's a function of age," cracked Popovich. "It is what it is and you can't make it what it's not. The only thing that's real is that it is a process. It's a journey. It's a long one. You can't force it. You can't make it go any quicker than you want it to go.

"The Lakers are the No. 1 seed. We don't even worry about it. It's not important anymore. They deserve credit. That's what they have. Our job is to be as healthy, as fresh and as well-schooled as can be come playoff time."

It's almost become an accepted way of life that the Spurs will take the early part of every season to find their bearings and that Popovich and general manager R.C. Buford never panic. In a league in which eight different teams changed head coaches before the All-Star break, the Spurs aren't usually done with their warm-up calisthenics until the calendar turns over to a new year.

"I think you just have to be a very good observer of what is going on out on the court and, if we're ahead of pace or if we're behind pace, just recognizing that is important," Popovich said. "But continuing to improve and being ready by playoff time is the point, not trying to rush it.

"If you're not as ready as you want to be, tough [spit]," added Pop, with a perspective gained from coaching 1,000 games from the Spurs' bench. "Just go play it anyway."

Last spring, San Antonio lost to the Lakers 4-1 in the playoffs when Manu Ginobili was limping around on a bad left ankle, meaning the Spurs couldn't be the Spurs. While much of the reaction to that loss was that the Spurs' window had closed, all Popovich wanted was another chance to deal a new hand from a healthy deck.

So he was willing to wait a month into the season to get Ginobili back from surgery on the bad ankle, tread water when Tony Parker missed a stretch with his bum ankle and run in place while Duncan sat out three games last month with a sore right knee.

It's never a case of not caring about every week or month or game of the season. But it's always a case of caring mainly about the bigger picture.

"If it was one game or two --- rather than eight --- in the standings, we wouldn't be trying harder," Popovich said. "I'd be holding guys to the same minute routines. I'm not gonna overplay them no matter what, whether we're close to the Lakers or not, because that's cutting off your nose to spite your face. It's not what's important. What's important is what I said about the playoffs."

Recently, Popovich moved Roger Mason Jr. into the backup point guard role behind Parker and shifted George Hill to two-guard. Now he has Ginobili back on the sidelines again for 15 games and counting, this time recovering from a stress reaction in his right ankle. If there is a reason for Popovich to worry, it's that ankle, not a loss to Oklahoma City or where the Spurs wind up in the standings.

"One would never turn down a higher seed," he said. "Any coach that tells you that is lying," he said. "It can be important. But we've done both. We won the seventh game in New Orleans last year and if you'd have asked me before the game, I would have said, 'Gee, I'd rather play this at home.' When we beat Detroit for the championship [in 2005], we had the seventh game at home. I wouldn't have said, 'Hey, I'd rather play the game in Detroit.'

"So, sure, you take it. But the best team really does win. In seven games, I can't think of a time when the best team did not win the series. When we used to have those three-game deals and the five-game series, it could happen. In a seven-game series last year, we were a teeny bit better than New Orleans, but we weren't as good as LA. I think that showed.

"It doesn't matter then if you have home or away. The best team is gonna win. Every time we won a championship, we won on the road. We won one or two games in every series on the road, because we were a better team. I think that proves out for every champion. If we're good enough, we'll find a way."

It's the way the Spurs are. Things get stirred up with them a little bit every once in a while. But they're never shaken.

Fran Blinebury covers the NBA for the Houston Chronicle.
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 2009-03-25 03:19  #2
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回复: Popovich calmly keeps Spurs pointed toward the big prize

Our job is to be as healthy, as fresh and as well-schooled as can be come playoff time
这话说得好啊。

现在马刺比赛有向之前火箭比赛转化的趋势阿,让人提心吊胆的。加油啊!!
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