It wasn’t quite the Knicks/Celtics game from Wednesday night, but the final four minutes of San Antonio @ Denver were pretty wild. Over the course of those four minutes, the Spurs were up seven, blew the lead, got it back, then briefly appeared to lose at the buzzer. It was their second game in a row that came down to the final possession… and the second game in a row that Manu Ginobili played hero.
Random Observations:
- Highlight Recap: Jeff Teague crosses over and throws the hammer down. Jordan Farmar and Kris Humphries Kardashian connect on an alley-oop. Melo with a nice in-and-out move. That’s all I’ve got… damn Thursdays…
- With 3:59 remaining in the fourth quarter, Tim Duncan converted a hook shot which put his Spurs up by seven. Denver cut the lead down to two with 2:30 on the clock, but Richard Jefferson knocked down a three to make it a five-point Spurs lead. The Nuggets were forced to play the foul game, and they ended up down three with the ball at the 17 second mark. Carmelo scored a dunk, and Denver prepared to send San Antonio back to the stripe. They didn’t have to, though, because the inbound pass was a bad one: it resulted in a turnover and a Denver score. We’re at the seven second mark now, Denver leading 112-111. Next, Manu Ginobili caught a risky cross-court pass and finished at the rim between three defenders. With four seconds left, it was Carmelo Anthony’s turn. Melo drove hard to the bucket and scored… but was called for a charge as he ran into Manu Ginobili. As much as I hate to admit it (I love the Nuggets, I hate the Spurs, Melo’s a favorite of mine, Ginobili’s not), the refs got it right. Manu had his feet set before Melo left the floor to shoot the ball (props to the official for having the balls to make that call). Manu was obviously huge at the end of the game, but he struggled much of the way, going just 5-15 from the floor and 2-10 from distance on the night. Tim Duncan picked up the slack and scored 28 points along with his 16 boards. Carmelo led the Nuggets with 31.
- The Celtics played without Rajon Rondo–who will miss the next week or two with a sprained ankle–but that didn’t keep them from beating the Hawks for their 12th consecutive win. The Cs got big games from a variety of players: KG had 17/14… Big Baby scored 18 off the bench… Nate Robinson did his best to make up for Rondo’s absense with 14/5 (and six turnovers)… Semih Erden made five of six shots and tied his career high with 10 points… etc. Jeff Teague and Marvin Williams were the only guys that did anything for ATL. They combined to score nearly half (44) of the Hawks’ 90 points. Boston ended up taking it by 12, 102-90.
- John Wall missed another game, and his Wizards lost their sixth in a row. Washington gave up 17 offensive boards to the Nets as they lost by eight. Kris Humphries grabbed 17 rebounds on his own, just one fewer than the entire starting frontcourt of the Wizards. He also scored 12 points to make it a double-double. I didn’t watch this game (did anyone?), but based on the numbers it looks like it was probably about as ugly as you’d think… both teams shot about 40% and turned the ball over 20 times. “It’s not the way we wanted to win,” said Devin Harris. When you’re a Net you don’t get to be picky. Devin knows that: “We have to be able to get it any way we can.” Had The Machine been able to play I’m sure it would’ve been a whole different story.
Quote of the Day: Avery Johnson on Devin Harris…
“Devin took charge on both ends of the floor for us. We need Devin to play like this. We need Devin to take shots.”
Take shots he did… 25, to be exact. He missed 18 of them.
Photo of the Day: Wednesday night’s celebration FAIL will not keep Nate Robinson from swagging out/stylin’ on em/acting a fool. Here he is showing the Hawks how to fly…
…and here he is running around in Shaq’s size 22s…
