They finally finished some of the freeway construction out by the airport here, and I’m wondering if we’ll be back yet again for more postseason time here. No one else in the Western Conference has impressed me too much, and if Manu Ginobili is as already as healthy as he looked tonight, I think a lot more highly of the Spurs than I did entering this season.
That said, the Lakers are a lot better than the Spurs and pretty certainly are going to be at season’s end. Everything was set up for San Antonio to roll through the weary Lakers in this game, and the Spurs couldn’t. The Lakers felt like they proved something just by coming so close to winning.
“This was a game that I was proud of the guys for coming back and playing like that,” Phil Jackson said. “They played a back-to-back game while the Spurs have been here for three days waiting for us.”
You’d expect the Spurs’ defense to get better as the season goes on, but I’m not sure Roger Mason and Matt Bonner are ever going to give Gregg Popovich what he expects there. Kobe Bryant wanted Trevor Ariza to shoot over Bonner on the last Lakers chance of the game, but Bonner actually did a pretty good job rotating off Lamar Odom and over to Ariza behind the 3-point arc after Manu Ginobili left Ariza to help Mason on Bryant.
“I expected Trevor just to step back and shoot it,” Bryant said. “That’ll just come from time playing together. I know they’re going ot run someone over and someone’s going to be wide open for a shot or penetration to the basket. … We got what we wanted. I could’ve risen up and shot it myself, but I felt like if one of my teammates – particularly Trevor – could get the opportunity just to drain a shot, a shot like that, it would take his game to a whole ‘nother level. It just didn’t work out.”
Bryant had gone to Ariza on another late-game possession for a 3-pointer that he missed also. As to whether Ariza was fouled by a recovering Ginobili on the last play, Bryant said: “I think he got tripped, but they’re not going to make that call.”
