The Spurs let one get away on Monday night, but tonight they tightened things up and played smarter to take control in the second half over a short-handed but game Dallas Mavericks squad. Things looked pretty bad in the first quarter as the Silver and Black gave up 8 turnovers which had Dallas leading by 8 after one quarter. The Spurs played better in the second quarter and took a narrow two point lead at the half. The third quarter turned on a challenge where a foul against Bismack Biyombo was reversed to an offensive foul on Dante Exum, turning a situation where the Mavericks could retake the lead into a situation where the Spurs were able to get a little breathing room. The Silver and Black took advantage of that momentum and closed out the game for a no-drama 10 point win that wasn’t as close as the final score.

They got a much better game from De’Aaron Fox tonight, with 32 points and a near triple double with 9 rebounds and 11 assists. Jeremy Sochan had a great night on his return to the court from injury with 18 timely points. After 8 rebounds in the first quarter, the Silver and Black cleaned up their act by only committing 8 more in the final three quarters. Defense was much better tonight, holding Spencer Dinwiddie to 14 and Klay Thompson to 12.

Rockabilly Break

Observations

• I think I wrote the most negative game thread intro today of any game I’ve pre-capped in all my years at PTR. I’m sorry, the loss to the Mavs on Monday just broke me. I might need an offseason to recover.
• Since the All Star Break, the Spurs have been playing well on offense, but the defense has fallen off a cliff. I mean, losing the best defender in the league definitely is a problem, but there’s no reason that the Silver and Black couldn’t be a competent defensive team, but they miss so many rotations and end up giving opponents wide open shots after even a few passes, as the team overhelps and collapses to the paint for no reason. They are going to need to clean that up, and maybe tonight is the right time to start doing that.
• Kessler Edwards is a pretty nice player on a 2-way contract. He’s undersized, but he plays extremely hard. He’s going to be on a regular contract soon.
• The Mavs took advantage of the Spurs butterfingers with 8 turnovers and led 28-20 after one quarter, finishing the quarter on a 19-4 run.
• The defensive miscues continued, giving up an easy Kessler Edwards dunk on an out of bounds play early in the second as both defenders let him go to take the inbounds pass. For once, Mitch Johnson called a time out after the defensive screwup, and the Spurs tightened up for the rest of the quarter, retaking the lead and leading 64-62 at the half.
• Brandon Williams didn’t play on Monday, but he made a big impact with his speed and quick hands tonight. He’s another 2-way player where it doesn’t make sense that he’s not on a regular NBA contract.
• The Spurs started out the second half on a 6-0 run led by Biyombo posting up on Kessler, probably the only time this year that he’s had a height advantage on the opposing center. You wonder why the Spurs didn’t exploit this matchup on Monday.
• The Spurs blunted a Dante Exum solo surge with a timely challenge of a Biyombo defensive foul that turned a defensive foul on Bismack to a offensive foul on Exum, leading to a quick 8-0 Spurs run to retake control of the game. The Spurs led 97-87 after three quarters by tightening up their defense after halftime and limiting Spencer Dinwiddie after he got free for a few easy drives to the bucket.
• Fox hasn’t quite been the clutch performer for the last couple of games that he was expected to be when he joined the Spurs, and part of that could be that it’s taking some time to build chemistry with his teammates, but it could also be due to the problems he’s having with a hand that’s going to require surgery. I think tonight he gave a glimpse of who he could be, and why the Spurs traded for him.
• One of my ongoing complaints about interim coach Mitch Johnson is that he seems to be too reluctant to call timeouts when his team is having trouble. That wasn’t a problem tonight, as his timing on timeouts was on point, stopping the game whenever his team needed a reset.

The Spurs next play the Hornets on Friday night. Charlotte only has 16 wins on the season so far, but they have a good shot at improving that total on March 14.