Watching the San Antonio Spurs play on the offensive end this series, it is obvious that the Spurs have gotten away from what has made them successful over the course of the regular season. While most of it has to do with the Grizzlies’ fantastic defense, I just get the nagging feeling that the Spurs have consciously been getting away from what they have done best. With the Spurs trailing the Grizzlies by five points with 4:00 left in the third quarter, we saw a perfect example of this:
After creating a turnover, the San Antonio Spurs were able to get out in transition with Parker bringing the ball down the court and Richard Jefferson running down the sideline.
Once Parker picks up the basketball, he is looking to pass it to Jefferson in the corner for the three in transition. However, Jefferson isn’t spotting up in the corner. He is cutting to the rim, looking for an attempt at the rim.
The result is a turnover due to miscommunication as the ball sails out of bounds with Jefferson being unable to make the catch.
This is just a simple case of Parker thinking that Jefferson is going to be spotting up in the corner, and Jefferson trying to get the ball to the rim. The reason why I think this was the Spurs getting away from their usual offense is because during the regular season, Jefferson was sprinting ahead and spotting up in the corner. Heck, this happened earlier in the series:
For whatever reason (maybe because the Grizzlies were so good running the Spurs off of the line, that they never really developed a flow/rhythm), Jefferson simply didn’t want to spot up at the three point line, and the result was a turnover. This was a big one, considering that the Spurs could have cut the lead to two points. However, that didn’t happen, and after this turnover, the Grizzlies were able to end the third quarter with a 13 point lead. By that point, the game was probably over.
