SAN ANTONIO — San Antonio Spurs head coach Mitch Johnson is emphasizing the obvious, that his team still is at home with a chance to even the NBA Finals on Friday night.
The positive perspective comes after San Antonio saw the New York Knicks rally and swipe Game 1 on Wednesday.
“Series are long. Games are long,” Johnson said Thursday of the team’s mindset on the day off between the first two games of the Finals. “Teams at this stage typically have shown the ability to evolve on the fly. In this moment right now, coming off a loss, it’s on us to get to the balancing act of change, tweak over here and get better over here.”
Johnson said he was generally pleased with the open looks the Spurs had on the offensive end. After reviewing film, he repeated his postgame assessment that San Antonio wasn’t aggressive enough attacking the rim during the 105-95 Game 1 defeat. He said it boils down to “respecting our style of basketball.”
Victor Wembanyama was bold in his assertion no one in his locker room is blinking. Point guard De’Aaron Fox said the Spurs are focused on how they built a 14-point lead in the third quarter and the process that created the double-digit advantage.
Knicks guard Jalen Brunson took 31 shots and scored 30 points. He broke out with 13 points in the fourth quarter by slicing through the Spurs’ defensive game plan of “anyone but Jalen,” while improving following an 11-point first half.
In film review, Fox circled the closing minutes, when the Spurs went from a one-point lead with 2:16 remaining to watching the Knicks close the game on a 11-0 run.
“It didn’t take too much film or too deep to dig to find the second-chance points, clearly one of them,” Johnson said. “Sixteen assists … is not a reflection of this program ever since I’ve been here and decades before I was. We can be a lot sharper on game-plan execution stuff. You add that I think Victor will play better, sure. A couple guys will make more shots than they did, agreed.”
