GT: Lakers vs. Spurs

[Nolan]

When: 8:30 PM ET, April 11, 2012
Where: AT&T Center, San Antonio, TX



VS



Starting Lineups:

Lakers:
PG - Ramon Sessions
SG - Devin Ebanks
SF - Metta World Peace
PF - Pau Gasol
C - Andrew Bynum

Spurs:
PG - Tony Parker
SG - Daniel Green
SF - Kawhi Leonard
PF - Tim Duncan
C - DeJuan Blair

Well no Kobe tomorrow night and we should be well rested after sitting the big three the other night in Utah.

Go Spurs!!

[co_laper]

This will be a great test for our bigs. Without Kobe, LA attacks the paint a lot with more touches for Bynum and Gasol, and then the penetration of Ramon. In some ways, they'll be like what Memphis is last year.

I'm predicting a win tonight, but will probably lose the Memphis game unless we just blow the Lakers out.

[co_laper]

Interesting comment from Tony Parker on Spurs.com regarding the Lakers' offense.

He said, Lakers run a lot of our stuff, and "We know how to guard that..."

For a little while, I forgot about Mike Brown. So I'm very curious how alike the Lakers are to what we are running or used to run in the old days.

In some ways, I see similarities in terms of personnel so it'll be interesting how well they run our stuff. I mean Gasol-Bynum something like a Duncan-Robinson type. Artest basically a defense guy who only shoots three pointers nowadays right kinda like Bowen? And then Sessions look to penetrate somewhat like Tony Parker. Kobe is Manu. I mean there are similarities in personnel.

If all the players all look the same and doesn't wear a number and team names in their jerseys, would we have trouble figuring out which team is the Spurs? Will be fun to see. I'm guessing if there is a team that plays like us in terms of system, it's got to be the Lakers. Whatever Avery is running in NJ does not look like it's from our playbook.

Can't wait to see this game.

[BigDaddyPR]

Manu playing tonight?

[co_laper]

Speechless.

Ok, perhaps Artest isn't gonna shoot like that every night, but Kobe might. Lakers, I thought, exposed us big time.

Our offense is predicated on penetrations. Early on, Parker and Manu tried getting to the rim but Bynum just dominated the boards and the basket area. It's the combination of Lakers' length on the perimeter along with shotblocking at the basket area. Parker/Manu couldn't get a shot up once they get to the paint and they had to kick it out. Now, our offense mostly become 3 point shooting because with us, it was always the paint or the three point shot. There's no midrange game to our offense. So now we're taking threes, but the Lakers do have enough length to get back to the shooters, which then makes our three point shooters trying to get to the rim but end up taking midrange jumpers. When that's not happening, it becomes a post up game for Duncan which he ends up facing up and shooting jumpers because he doesn't have a size advantage over either one.

And then on defense, Lakers' bigs simply dominated us. We can't get to the offensive board. We can't keep them off either. They used their size well getting plenty of post up opportunities for Gasol/Bynum/Artest.

I stopped watching after late in the 3rd quarter hoping that I get surprised when I see the final boxscore instead.

This isn't a one game thing. Againts good defenses, this is what other teams are capable of forcing us to do. Memphis did this last year. Boston did this a few games ago. Lakers are doing this to us better than all of them because they do have the size down low.

When is our next meeting againts LA? It's got to be a closer game than this. We can't get killed for all 3 games. I'll give Lakers their props tonight. They were amazing. Lakers defense is definitely light years better than ours right now.

[co_laper]

The only thing that makes this easier to swallow is that OKC lost to LAC too. So atleast we're still the same on the loss column.

[SinJackal]

Like I said, pointless to rest in Utah. We should've played (and won) that game, and just rested tonight. That way we'd be 1-1 right now and rested for tomorrow, rather than being 0-2 and staring down the barrel of a 0-3 stretch and not even being fully rested.

Popovich blew it imo. We threw away a winnable game in Utah for a 1% better chance to beat LA and we lost. Even if we did beat LA, it would've at most been a gamble that we broke even on. . .we would've gained nothing than just switching around the games he rested guys in. Horrible move.

And don't tell me, "well at least they didn't get injured in Utah", because nobody who did play did, and you can't tell me that.

I'm very disappointed in Pop's decision. I always back the guy too. . .so know that I'm not a Pop basher. It's just, man, we'd be ahead in the standings right now and looking in great shape to close the season. But no. . .sigh.

Not looking forward to the rest of the pointless rest days chosen to be taken during the wrong games.

[aal04]

I dont think its so much rest, but moreso avoiding injury. Phoenix is a brutally physical team.

Atleast we know what our biggest problem is, unfortunately, so does every other team now too.

[co_laper]

Anybody knows what's wrong with Neal? They listed him with an injury I have never heard of. Geontronosis or whatever. Something with a G.

[aal04]

Gastroenteritis = Runs.

[Donald Kaufman]

Anybody knows what's wrong with Neal? They listed him with an injury I have never heard of. Geontronosis or whatever. Something with a G.

Gastro = stomach virus. Highly contagious so I hope the rest of the guys are safe. It knocked the Magic on their asses last season or the one before that, can't remember. Just about every player got it.

Speaking of vomit inducing things, what about the way Bynum shuffles his feet every time he's got the ball on the block? He's a great player without doubt, and he absolutely destroyed us in this game, but he travels freaking every time.