What We Learned from the Spurs win over the Jazz

28/03/2024 18:59

San Antonio takes advantage of a great shooting night.

Winning seems easy. Feels like something the Spurs should do more of. Wednesday's game was an entirely pleasant experience from start to finish. San Antonio came out of the gates firing. They held on when they were challenged and they finished strong. They shot the lights out. They played great team defense. I mean, yeah. 10 out of 10. No notes!

Ok. Some notes. The turnovers are still killing me. I know, seems crazy to even bring it up right now but we have to. We've got to shine a light because it still feels like the most emblematic issue for a team that wants to good but can't help but do bad. They still get sloppy. The decision making ability seems to just fly out the window and great opportunities fall apart before they even have a chance to get going. They're either going too fast or going to slow. Thinking too much or not enough. It's been a season-long search for balance and they still can't quite dial it in for a game. It's a problem.

Another note. I love Devin Vassell evolving into an offensive force. It's a good look on him. He's feeling himself right now and you can tell that every time he gets the ball he's hunting. Every shot feels like a good one. The basket is the size of the ocean. He could be falling out of bounds surrounded by two defenders and he's still look up and be like, "I think I got this." It's a fun thing and I had fun watching it. That said, our offensive plan can't be "Devin shoots 60% from the field." Just like it can't be "hope Victor goes supernova." The Spurs were bailed out of a lot of bad-to-medium possessions by Devin deciding to just be The Dude last night and, as much fun as that is, it's hard to think it's sustainable.

One more note. Let's see, uh...Wembanyama needs to be....uh...even better? Yea. Vic needs to be better. Five blocks? Only five blocks? Yawn. We get it, he's tall. We've seen him get five blocks before, shoot, we see it practically every other time he hits the floor and, frankly, it's getting boring. Doesn't give me the buzz it used to. The law of diminishing returns demands that we get 7-8 blocks per game from Wemby. At a minimum! I want double digits every few games. No ball should ever feel safe from the long arms of the Wembanyama law.

Obviously it's hard to find too much at fault with the Spurs' seven point win in Utah. Shoot, they're on a dang winning streak right now, we should be practically be pulling out the champagne and firing up the boats for a river parade. This is the type of play that it feels like these guys should be capable of every night. It's the type of game that makes something like that fumbled loss to Memphis the other night sting a little more than it used to. These guys are getting better. They are figuring out what to do and we've seen them execute it.

I think everyone realizes that the time for excuses is rapidly drawing to a close. It's no longer just about "getting a little better" every night. They've worked their butts off to raise the standard of expectations that we should have for them and boy are we proud of them for doing so. But that's just the first step. Now it's about repeating the process. I want to see games like this over and over and over again.

This season might be drawing to a close, but it feels like everything is just getting started.

Takeaways:

• Can't say enough about how much fun Devin is to watch right now. I don't know if a switch flipped with him or something but it feels like he's really coming into his own as player. He's had a tough time momentum-wise. His injury last year was obviously a huge blow and then you could tell that it was taking him a little longer to mesh his playing style alongside Victor's. You'd be forgiven for worrying about whether or not he has the juice. Well, fear not. The juice is loose. He's feeling confident with his shot and when that's going down for him, the whole court opens up. He's dropping into his two man game with Vic like they've been doing it for years and it just looks so smooth right now. I love it. I need to shut up about it so I don't scare it away.
• Jeremy Sochan has put together a really nice stretch of games. He's so hard to evaluate because his game is pretty amorphous. It's full of intangible things and little moments that make a huge difference even if they aren't necessarily filling out the box score. Veteran watchers of this weird little Spurs campaign know when we're having a good Sochan night versus a bad one and trying to define the reasons why is like trying to explain why the flavor of an apple tastes good. It's an apple. It's, I dunno, sweet? Tart? Apple-ish? It tastes good because it...it tastes good. Leave me alone! The point is, Jeremy has been good lately. Don't ask me how I know that.
• It's insane that the Spurs had 40 assists. I'm not going to look up their numbers on the year because I don't have that kind of time and, frankly, whenever I start delving into historical stats my eyes start to glaze over. But 40 seems like a lot! It certainly felt like a lot while watching it. It made the offense feel better and more in rhythm. The Spurs shot well, which helps, but this kind of ball movement clearly suits the guys on the floor. The looks were better. The defense wasn't forcing them out of their actions. The air felt more crisp. More ball movement please!
• I know I complained about Victor needing to get more blocks and, clearly, that's just a very funny bit from Dr. Jokes over here but, on a real level, I do kind of want to see him get more blocks. It's maybe my favorite thing that happens in Spurs games at the moment and I'm starting to crave it. Any time an opposing player wanders into the paint I sort of sit up in my chair. Is he going to try it? Does he think he has an opening? Do it. Throw it up. See what happens! I love all the blocks with Vic coming out of nowhere for a deft little touch. Vic being an absolute unscalable wall. Vic standing behind a dude and just grabbing it. It's all the best. My greatest fear is that he's getting too good at this and we're just going to stop seeing people challenge him all together.

WWL Post Game Press Conference

- Do you feel out of practice writing about wins?

- A little bit, yea. It's a hard muscle to leave dormant for soo long. I think I've only written about three wins this season and last year wasn't....too much better. Again, I don't like digging into stats and data so I won't.

- You don't feel like that's a part of your job?

- Stats and data? Absolutely not. If they wanted me to be digging into stats and data I'm sure someone would've told me by now.

- You don't think that writing about a team from a place of "authority" on the subject implies that you should have a cursory understanding of basketball stats?

- I think a lot of things and I'd be happy to tell you about them but one thing I do not think is that I should, under any circumstances, assume that extra work on my part is implied. That goes against everything I believe in. A man got to have a code.