San Antonio Spurs: 3 takeaways from Game 3 vs. Warriors

3. Too much is being left to too few

This has been the cry of the San Antonio Spurs faithful this year. LaMarcus Aldridge has taken the load without Kawhi Leonard. To say he has done a brilliant job is an understatement. The Spurs made it to the seventh seed in the Western Conference with Kawhi only playing nine games.

Aldridge has had support. Dejounte Murray was tremendous at the start of the season. Rudy Gay and Patty Mills had been playing well toward the end of the season. However, when playoff time comes around, you have to be humming as a team. After all, you are playing against the best teams of the year.

Looking at players who played 16 minutes or more on the bench, Paul Gasol scored six points, as did Kyle Anderson. Davis Bertans only scored five points and Manu Ginobili failed to put the ball through the hoop. Tony Parker saved the bench by scoring 16 points.

These numbers are made worse by the fact that both Murray and Danny Green only scored nine points apiece as starters. It might be said that this is a good spread of points. The problem is that when Aldridge was down on his usual numbers, no one else stepped up to cover the difference.

The Warriors bench scored 39 to the Spurs’ 37. To beat the Warriors when Aldridge only has 18 points, someone else needs to step up and accept the challenge.