NBA Playoffs 2013: San Antonio Spurs vs. Los Angeles Lakers Series Recap
By Phil Watson
Well, that was fast. The Los Angeles Lakers hardly let out a whimper, much less put up a fight, in going down in four straight games to the San Antonio Spurs. For San Antonio’s aging core of Tim Duncan, Manu Ginobili and Tony Parker, the early finish means some needed rest before embarking on the Western Conference semifinals.
For the Lakers, the end means an offseason of questions, beginning with free agent Dwight Howard’s status and continuing through the health of aging guard Kobe Bryant and ancient guard Steve Nash.
Let’s take a look at the series in review:
Game Scores (San Antonio wins 4-0)
Game 1 at San Antonio: Spurs 91, Lakers 79
Game 2 at San Antonio: Spurs 102, Lakers 91
Game 3 at Los Angeles: Spurs 120, Lakers 89
Game 4 at Los Angeles: Spurs 103, Lakers 82
The Lakers’ banged-up backcourt had no answers for Tony Parker. (Photo: Mark Runyon, Basketball Schedule)
Series MVP
Tony Parker
The French point guard started slowly in the series, scoring 18 points in Game 1 on 8-of-21 shooting, but the All-Star picked it up from there. Parker had 28 points and seven assists in Game 2 and in Games 3 and 4, with every Laker guard save for Chris Duhon, Darius Morris and Andrew Goudelock out with injuries, Parker toyed with the leftover Laker backcourt. Over the final two games, Parker had 43 points—including 23 in the Game 4 clincher—and 11 assists in just a shade more than 53 minutes of playing time.
That came after Parker logged almost 74 minutes in the first two games.
For the series, Parker averaged a team-high 25.2 points per game, along with 7.4 assists and 1.4 steals, while shooting 49.3 percent. His player-efficiency rating (PER) for the series was a cool 29.3 (15 is considered average, so, yeah, Parker was pretty much All-World over the course of these four games) and he combined an offensive rating of 116 with a defensive mark of 96.
Nice series.
DeJuan Blair made the most out of limited minutes in the first round. (Photo: Mark Runyon, Basketball Schedule).
Biggest Surprise
Blair had been a forgotten man in coach Gregg Popovich’s rotation for the Spurs and had been actively shopped in the days leading up to the trade deadline in February.
Instead, San Antonio held onto their backup big man and he went nuts against the Lakers. After averaging career lows of 14 minutes, 5.4 points and 3.8 rebounds during the regular season, Blair took advantage of his limited opportunities in this series, averaging 6.5 points and 3.3 rebounds per game.
That may not sound all that impressive … until you consider that Blair produced those numbers in 11.3 minutes a game. His advanced numbers are off the charts—a PER of 30.4, an offensive rating of a ridiculous 147 and an effective field-goal percentage (eFG%) of 70.6. With 20.8 points and 10.4 rebounds per 36 minutes, it could be argued that after Duncan, Blair was the best big man in the series.
Dwight Howard was a very big disappointment at a time when the Lakers needed him the most. (Photo by Howard Cheng/Wikimedia Commons)
Biggest Disappointment
Dwight Howard
With the Lakers rotation stripped down by the end of the series to Howard, Pau Gasol and a bunch of who-dats, any chance Los Angeles had of keeping it even remotely closed hinged on Howard.
Not so much.
Howard averaged 17 points and 10.8 rebounds per game in the series, which were slightly below his regular-season totals of 17.1 and 12.4, respectively.
Then there was the ejection early in the second half of Game 4, one of the most selfish acts ever witnessed in playoff basketball. Even Laker legend Magic Johnson couldn’t resist calling out Dwight on Twitter for his boneheaded move.
At a time when his team needed him more than ever before to come up big, Howard instead was quite small.
Logo courtesy sportslogos.net
What’s Next
vs. Golden State Warriors or Denver Nuggets
The Spurs await the winner of the surprisingly one-sided series between the Warriors and Nuggets. The dates for Game 1 will be announced, but Sunday, May 5, would be the earliest the next series would begin. A week off won’t be a bad thing for the Spurs. Popovich and his core of veterans have done this for a long time now and when the ball goes up to tip off the conference semifinals, this group will be ready .