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Spurs eliminate Suns, reach NBA Finals

Stoudemire scores 42 in losing effort

Image: DuncanReuters
San Antonio's Tim Duncan goes to the basket against Phoenix center Amare Stoudemire during Game 5 of the NBA Western Conference finals on Wednesday.

Along the way, the Suns had four turnovers (traveling by Nash, two lost balls by Stoudemire and a 24-second violation), Nash missed three shots, Stoudemire missed one and the flourish ended with Joe Johnson getting blocked twice.

The Spurs, meanwhile, had Tony Parker find his groove by hitting one of his trademark teardrop jumpers and two straight 3-pointers. Duncan passed out of a double team to an open Bruce Bowen for a jumper, then — perhaps the best sign of all for the Spurs — Duncan made two free throws.

Duncan finished 14-of-24 from the field and 3-of-4 from the foul line, missing only his first one. It barely made it to the front rim, an ugly reminder of his 3-for-12 performance from the line in Game 4.

“Tim makes all those guys better,” said Nash, who had 21 points and 10 assists. “He’s a tremendous player, a team player, and a winner.”

Ginobili had 19 points, eight rebounds and six assists. Parker scored 18, although he was 8-for-21.

Johnson, whose big performance in Game 4 was the Suns’ biggest hope for coming back in the series, cooled off by shooting just 6-of-17 for 14 points. Unlike the last game, his presence didn’t help open things up for Shawn Marion and Quentin Richardson. Marion had eight points and Richardson, who went down hard in the first half, was scoreless in 28 minutes.

Nash scored only three points in the second half.

Notes: The Suns became the 13th team to lose three straight home games in a postseason. Their ’93 team that made the Finals also did it. ... With Phoenix out, the highest-scoring team will not win the title for the 49th time in the NBA’s 59 seasons, and it’ll be the 27th time the team with the best regular-season record doesn’t win it all. ... San Antonio’s Tony Massenburg got into the game for the first time this series with 2:53 left in the first half after Nazr Mohammed picked up his third foul. Massenburg has played a key role this series, though — he was Stoudemire’s stand-in during practices.

© 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


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