The 2007-2008 NBA season could mark the end of several eras of its teams. The uprising boosts of the New Orleans Hornets and Los Angeles Lakers are now the two premier top tier classes of the Western Conference, probably — and hopefully — instigating future rivalries with each other that will live out through the years of the days of Chris Paul and David West against Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol.
However, the Seven Seconds or Less era and Fundamentals era is coming to a close.
The Suns’ era is more imminent — albeit not fully over — because of D’Antoni leaving (allegedly to Chicago), which means they’ll pretty much start over. And for a coach to preach defense to them, that will instantly make Steve Nash an even bigger defensive liability and liability itself since his MVP days are clearly over with. And Shaq is as old as dirt, and his contract is one of the most overbearing pieces of crap out there.
As for the Spurs, their series isn’t nearly over, especially since they haven’t even played at the AT&T Center in San Antonio yet. However, the way the Hornets have been running the floor against the current day NBA dynasty is mind boggling. The Spurs are looking older and older while the Suns are looking younger and younger. David West has had a huge series and Chris Paul has been — as usual this season — lighting it up. With Peja Stojakovic being left wide open for 3s, however, the beast in the Spurs may awaken. The best head coach in all of basketball, Gregg Popovich (in my opinion), is easily (yes, easily) the best coach in the league at making adjustments. So I’ll be surprised if the Spurs play as bad as they have these last two games. Yes, you can’t double team every player on the court, but the Spurs are (or were?) so good defensively that they don’t need double teams, just containment.
However, looking back, the Spurs must win these next two games or it will definitely be New Orleans’ series to lose since the way they’ve been playing doesn’t look like it’s going to lessen in levels any time soon. San Antonio’s time is coming to a close, and if they want back-to-backs, they’ll need to pull out a couple of coming of age (isn’t that a fitting title?) performances over the next four (maybe five) games.
1 Comment
May 6, 2008 at 8:57 pm
I do agree the Spurs need to hold serve at home to have a chance, and they may very well do so. Still, I have seen the energy the Hornets play with at home, never getting down when down, etc. and I am going to hold to my prediction of Hornets in seven. We owe San Antonio the chance to dip into the fountain of youth one more time. The Spurs aren’t dead yet…but the Grim Reaper will be seated courtside in San Antonio just in case…