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Reuters
SAN ANTONIO - A long layoff wasn’t going to bother the San Antonio Spurs. Even a week off could not make Tim Duncan and Tony Parker forget how to play in the NBA finals.
With LeBron James’ much-hyped finals debut falling flat, Duncan and Parker led the Spurs to an 85-76 victory over the Cleveland Cavaliers in Game 1 of the NBA finals on Thursday night.
Parker led the Spurs with 27 points and seven assists while Duncan had 24 points, 13 rebounds and five blocks.
“Tony was terrific,” Cavs coach Mike Brown said. “We have to do a better job of keeping him out of the paint.”
Parker drove the lane, his acrobatic moves finding the basket time and again.
“Tony gets to the rim all the time,” Duncan said. “And there’s no knocking anyone, the Cavs or anyone else. But with his quickness, his ability to finish in the lane, he gets in there almost at will.”
And Duncan, whose calm steadiness is credited with guiding the team, could be on his way to a fourth finals MVP title if the Spurs beat the Cavs three more times.
“All in all I thought we contained very well,” Duncan said. “We did a pretty good job on LeBron, not giving him the lanes that he’s used to. We won the game, we held them to 76 points. That’s right where we need to be.”
Game 2 is Sunday in San Antonio before the series moves to Cleveland.
The Spurs hadn’t played since midway through last week, when they beat the Utah Jazz to win the Western Conference title.
But the often-understated Spurs weren’t without a little flair Thursday. They revved up the crowd, mostly dressed in white shirts reading “Go Spurs Go,” with six 3-pointers.
The Spurs finished 6-of-16 from beyond the arc with Manu Ginobili, who had 16 points, hitting half of the 3s.
Ginobili acknowledged after the game that the Spurs were a little rusty. They started off slowly on offense, but it was hard to tell from watching Parker and Duncan.
And as a key piece of the Spurs’ league-leading defense, Bruce Bowen was largely responsible for holding James to just 14 points.
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“He’s guarded every position throughout these playoffs, and he’s done a great job with it,” Duncan said of Bowen. “So a lot of credit to him.”
Duncan and Parker combined to go 22-of-40 from the field. They had 38 points in the first three quarters — only 11 fewer than the Cavs.
When Duncan couldn’t finish Parker’s alley-oop pass for a dunk with the Spurs up by nine and 2:47 left in the third quarter, he apologized by taking Parker under his arm and patting his head as the two shared a laugh walking back up the court.
“I think Tony, he plays his best basketball when he’s aggressive,” Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. “Our aggressiveness oftentimes begins with him, no matter how anybody plays him in the pick-and-roll, his ability to penetrate or get the ball to the other side of the court gets us going.”
Kobe Bryant hit a baseline jump shot with 4.2 seconds left and the Los Angeles Lakers wrapped up a six-game road trip by holding on to beat the Raptors 94-92 on Sunday, their eighth victory in nine meetings with Toronto
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The Week in Sports Pictures The Giants on top of the football world, getting ready for the London Olympics and more. more photos |
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Wesseling: Each NFL team enters the offseason with a series of pressing needs. Sometimes a team can address them all, sometimes they ignore them all. But if a team's smart, they'll listen to us. These are the most crucial aspects for AFC teams.
Ryan Callahan scored for the fifth time in four days and defenseman Ryan McDonagh snapped a second-period tie to lift the New York Rangers to a 3-2 victory over the Washington Capitals on Sunday.
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