Nekias Duncan and Steve Jones Jr. break down the Spurs paltry offensive performance against Minnesota. Check out the full conversation on “The Dunker Spot” and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or wherever you listen.
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Video Transcript
But I think, how did you feel about the Spurs offense?
‘Cause, and I ask that because in, in my brain as you were watching that game, right?
Minnesota- Mm-hmm is defending at a high level.
They’re aggressive and attacking offensively.
The Spurs, as good as they are with movement, as good as their guard play is, they don’t have a finisher right now.
Like, they don’t have the finishing move, which is interesting for the Wolves coming off a Denver series where they had super finishers as far as Jokic- Mm-hmm and Murray.
And, like, you have to deal with this move.
Like, but the Spurs don’t have that to a degree.
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So how did you feel about the Spurs offense?
I felt kind of odd about the Spurs offense through this one.
And this, again, this was more of a defensive battle as we both alluded to on Friday and, you know, earlier in this conversation.
82.6 half court offensive rating for the Wolves, not good.
80 offensive rating in the half court for the San Antonio Spurs, also not good in this one.
And I think from a process perspective, and I think it kinda ties into the way that the Wolves closed, it felt so perimeter-based for the San Antonio Spurs.
And, like, that isn’t always bad.
You know, we’ve been talking throughout the year, I like the Spurs’ early offense.
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They’re going into their flares.
They can kick it on the perimeter and then get to their drive and kick that way.
They can invert it with Wemby pick and rolls.
You know, Stephon Castle can initiate.
Dylan Harper, when he comes off the bench, he can initiate.
DeJounte Fox, et cetera.
So, like, they have a bunch of different options.
I think your point that they don’t have the firm this is the pet set, this is the pet combo thing, or at least not consistently so, it really stood out in this basketball game.
Because once you couldn’t get to the I always think of the Sixers, where it’s like Tobi- you know, Tyrese Maxey bringing it up the floor, Tobias Harris rolling behind him, just a quick pitch to him and drive.
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Spurs did that a bunch for Wemby to get him downhill.
Outside of that, I don’t know if I felt like there was something that the Spurs were comfortable just getting to consistently.
Like, they mixed in the Wemby pick and rolls and if it didn’t work, they kinda had to search.
You get some Stephon Castle pick and roll.
If they didn’t have anything initially, they kinda had to search.
It was a similar thing with DeJounte Fox.
They kind of had to search.
And so I do kind of wonder what they feel like their method of, their best method of attack in the half court is going to be in this series, especially if Minnesota is going to downsize to this degree, be comfortable switching and/or pressuring to this degree.
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Like, what can the Spurs get to?
‘Cause I, I know a lot of people are gonna look at the Wemby box score and see 0 of 8 from three and be like, “Hey, man, get your tall self down there.”
And, like, there is some of that, but also, like, how many middle touches did the Forget if they, if it actually worked.
How many middle touches did we get from Wemby in this basketball game?
It didn’t feel like a lot.
Like, there was one around the three-minute mark of the fourth quarter where they get Julius Randle, get him a touch against Julius Randle at the free throw line, and he drew a foul out of that.
But, like, I wish there was a little bit more intention about moving Wemby around offensively and getting him more work inside the arc, because once the perimeter stuff kind of dried up- Well- it felt more difficult.
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Well, I mean, I think this is where if you wanna hand the Spurs some bail, okay, we know how Minnesota wants to guard them, so let’s figure out how to kinda move the things around the board.
So while they don’t have the hard finisher, go back to that Portland series and they said, “Wemby, get in the corner.
Someone’s screening for you.
We’ll make that a pressure point.”
Mm-hmm.
“We’ll play out of it.”
And so there are things they can get to.
It’s just gonna be interesting to see in game two what do they land on.