Emptying the noggin
· There were some bright spots tonight and we will get to them but the 22 turnovers by the team and inability to grab a defensive rebound in the 4th quarter overwhelmed all of the other items to the night.
· The offense in the 4th quarter completely dissolved. The Jazz had 4 straight possession where they possession ended with a bail out three. Keyonte made one but each possession just went no where and then someone had to throw up a prayer.
· The issue with the turnovers is you can see them happen before they happen. Someone drives into relatively obvious traffic and you can see that the ball is going to get stripped and end up with transition the other way.
· San Antonio really added to the pressure in the 2nd half and the Jazz had a really hard time completing passes on the perimeter and this lead to some of the turnovers. This is often on the receiver who need to be back cutting or setting their man up to get open and make themselves available to the passer.
· The Spurs had 8 offensvie rebounds in the 4th quarter. A lot of these were around the free throw line and long rebounds. Usually players are supposed to crash to the free throw line to be able to help on rebounding.
· Lauri Markkannen was guarding Victor Wembanyama and as Victor drove he brought his left knee across into the inside of Lauri’s left knee and Lauri went down in pain and was helped off the floor putting limited weight on his left leg.
· Keyonte George’s first quarter was as good as he can be. He played with great confidence. He buried his shots. He had super vision. He was a domiant player on the floor. He had a career high 15 points in the first quarter.
· John Collins had a first quarter career high with 7 rebounds in the first quarter
· The offenses ruled the day for both teams. It was 66-66 at halftime and both teams offensive rating was a 121. The Jazz was a 132 at the end of the first quarter.
· Brice Sensabaugh had a monster 2nd quarter. He has worked really hard on his shot and his shot release and it is paying off. He is a Bonafide NBA shooter.
· Victor Wembanyama is something we have never seen. I am tried to figure out his future. I know this sounds nuts but he might average 40 points a game. There is no limit to how many shots he can get off in a game. He is taking 15 threes a game right now and there is nothing that is preventing that number from being 20. If he turns into a 40% three point shooter that is 8 makes from 3 a game. That is 24 points. Then takes another 10 to 15 shots a game in post, on jumpers, on drives, on fast breaks and he makes half of those and he is at 34 to 40. What happens on nights when he gets hot. He is so skilled there isn’t a limit of what he can do. Tonight he caught at the elbow dribbled once with his right hand then took the ball behind his back to a left hand dribble and then tried to finish on the reverse side. On another play he reached over the top of 6’9 John Collins like he was irrelevant tapped the rebound to himself turned around and took the ball coast to coast and made a last second pass to Castle for a rebound. Truly, we have never seen anything like this and I am trying to expand my mind to understand what this might become.
· The NBA Cup aspect meant the Spurs tried to add on every point possible late including a Stephon Castle three in the final seconds.
