Coming back home after a couple of disappointing losses, and not just in the loss column department, the San Antonio Spurs looked to start the home stand strong against the Portland Trail Blazers. Stephon Castle started his second straight game in the absence of Jeremy Sochan and took the Anfernee Simons matchup head on. He started the scoring, had a few nice assists, and played solid defense. He finished the first with six points and three assists. The quarter started off a bit sluggish, though, as the Spurs trailed 15-13 at the six-minute mark. This prompted a Mitch Johnson timeout that helped reset the team. They came out of that and went on a 14-3 run to give them a 27-18 lead. With 28 seconds remaining, Keldon Johnson was called for a flagrant on Jerami Grant three-pointer. This resulted in a five-point possession for the Blazers and a 33-27 after one.
The second quarter started a bit like the first, with the Blazers doing a good job of cutting into the Spurs lead – only for the bench to come in and go on a run. The bench unit started the game 10/12 from the field and 3/3 from three. In fact, the only bench player to miss a shot up to this point of the game was Keldon, but he made up for it a bit with seven rebounds. The ball was whipping around, guys were making timely cuts, and they were flying around defensively. When Blake slammed it home off a back cut and nice Zach Collins pass, the Spurs led 54-45 with 3:54 left in the half. But Deandre Ayton made sure the Blazers kept it close. He scored six of his 17 points in the final 3:30, and the Blazers closed out the quarter on a 10-2 run. After leading by as much as 11, the Spurs went to the locker room only up one, 56-55.
The first four minutes of the third quarter was a bit of a Julian Champagnie show. He hit two three-pointers and had an assist to Wemby under the basket to attribute to the Spurs first eight points. With the Spurs leading 64-62 and bringing the ball in under their basket, Wemby and Jerami Grant got into a battle of who could get the most leverage, which resulted in Wemby hitting the ground twice. After things got settled, the battle continued until Wemby drew a dead-ball foul. He would go on to hit a free throw, and Malaki Branham would make a three that possession to give the Spurs a little breathing room. The Branham three was just one of the three-point barrage the Spurs laid on the Blazers in the quarter. Out of the Spurs 35 points, 24 of them were from behind the arc. Those threes and the play of the bench slowly kept building the Spurs lead – pushing that one-point halftime lead to 12 heading into the fourth.
That momentum didn’t carry over, unfortunately, with the Blazers starting the fourth on a 9-2 run to trim the Spurs lead to five, 93-88. Double unfortunately, that was in large part due to Wemby’s play. His first four minutes went turnover, a missed tip, and three missed shots before finally getting a three to fall as the trail man. Moments before that three, Mitch Johnson used a timeout at just the right time once again. When play started back up, the Spurs would go on an 8-2 run to push their lead back out to 101-90, which after another few minutes of good Spurs basketball, would turn into a 108-95 lead with five minutes left. The next three minutes wouldn’t be what we’d call beautiful basketball. Both teams would foul, miss shots, and turn it over (three of the Blazers five points were free throws and Castle made two field goals). With 1:16 left, Castle hit Keldon for a layup that caused Chauncey Billups to call timeout and bring the reserves in. Once it was all said and done, the Spurs would prevail 118-105.
Game Notes
Stephon Castle is going to be a good shooter. There’s a lot that could be said about Stephon Castle’s play thus far as a rookie. One thing in particular is how he’s not shooting the ball well from three in the slightest. After tonight, Castle is 3/24 from three. That equates to 12.5%. If he was to play enough to hit 200 three-point attempts, that percentage would decimate the record for worst percentage for a player who took at least 200 threes (Marcus Smart shot a paltry 25.3% on 241 attempts). Here’s the thing though: His shot is actually pretty nice as far as form goes. It’s almost the Malaki Branham scenario because when you watched Malaki his first two years, you saw a player who could score and shoot well in the midrange. And while his insane 52% on 2.8 attempts per game might not be sustainable, Malaki has seemingly found his stroke from outside. I’d bet that with more and more NBA reps, we’ll see Castle become somebody the Spurs can trust to make at least 35%.
Jeremy Sochan is missed. It’s hard to say any team was missing a player when they win comfortably. That’s not necessarily true when it comes to how the Spurs matched up with the Blazers. Jerami Grant is the kind of player the Spurs haven’t had a great matchup for defensively. He’s too quick and shoots too well to guard him with a big. He’s too big to guard him with a slight wing. Grant ended the night 6/10 from the field, but three of those misses were from three, and he worked his way to the free throw line 11 times, making eight. His strong offensive performance wasn’t good enough in this one, but figuring out how to guard players like this will be important for the Spurs moving forward.
The Blazers are big. Something noticeable right away was the size of the starting lineup Chauncey Billups threw out there. Those five were the 6’4” Anfernee Simons, 6’8” Toumani Camara, 6’8” Jerami Grant, 6’9” Deni Avdija, and 7’0” Deandre Ayton. Scoot Henderson is the only player listed shorter than Simons at 6’3”, but he’s also stout and strong. They might not quite have the overall talent to be a play-in team or better, but there’s something to like about how they’ve built out their roster up to this point.
Just plant Julian Champagnie in the left corner. Every player has a spot on the court they shoot better from. The best shooters have more than one of those spots. After he made his second three from the left corner, it clicked to look up what his numbers are from the different areas on the court. Coming into this game, Champagnie had made five of 10 attempts from the left corner three. From the right corner? He was 1/6. Those left corner numbers got better after he went 4/5 tonight. The Spurs likely know these numbers, so it wouldn’t be surprising to see them put Champagnie in the *left* corner.
A good Zach Collins is a good Spurs team. I try to avoid using “I” in the articles I write, but I’m going to break that for this point. That’s because I’ve been somewhat vocal about how Collins played last season and how he’s played so far this year (see post below). I’m not here to issue an apology for this criticism because he was awesome against the Blazers. Rather, I’m here to address how important it is the Spurs get this Collins game after game. Maybe there are matchups that aren’t good for him – that happens. But if he can be close to what he was last night in a majority of games, we’ll be looking at a potential playoff team.
The unexpected best lineup of the night. With the injuries the Spurs are dealing with, they’re dependent on some rotations that might not have been ideal before the season started. Against the Blazers, there was one five-man lineup at the top of the +/- leaderboard nobody would’ve guessed if given the chance. Those five were Zach Collins, Keldon Johnson, Julian Champagnie, Malaki Branham, and Stephon Castle. That lineup outscored the Blazers by 11 points in their 4.3 minutes on the court. Honorable mention goes to Collins, Keldon, Malaki, Blake Wesley, and Harrison Barnes who played 1.9 minutes together and outscored the Blazers by 8. That’s the kind of bench production every team yearns for.
Play of the game
Sure, this play ends with a foul instead of being one of the 35 assists the Spurs had tonight (Harrison Barnes split the ensuing free throws), but this pass from Wemby is special.
Next Game: Vs Utah Jazz on Saturday
The Spurs face off against the Jazz in the second of five straight games at home. Game tips off at 4 PM CT as it also happens to be Kids Takeover Night
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