San Antonio – Must-win game. Bounce-back game. Wake-up call. All of those terms, used in conjunction with the San Antonio Spurs on Monday in the wake of their Game 1 loss to the Nuggets, are really only so much bunk, according to forward Robert Horry.
“I don’t understand how people say those things,” Horry said Monday. “Every game is a pressure game. Every game is a game you need to win.”
And while the 14-year veteran was at it, Horry decided to chip away at some other sporting chestnuts.
Like his team needing to make a multitude of adjustments in order to even the best-of-seven series Wednesday night at the AT&T Center, or the Nuggets insisting they weren’t happy with their winning performance in the opening contest.
“That’s all standard playoff-speaking,” Horry said. “They talk, we talk. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens (in Game 2).”
The answer
Spurs coach Gregg Popovich has been known to make reporters who ask what he deems to be stupid questions wither on the vine like so many raisins-in-waiting. However, when he was asked following his squad’s workout whether Allen Iverson made a difference in the Nuggets’ fortunes, he quickly nodded in agreement.
The fact that Iverson managed to finish with a game-high 31 points despite missing his first six shots wasn’t a surprise to Spurs forward Bruce Bowen. But the defensive specialist said it did point out the difference in how an offensive player approaches the game versus someone who makes his living at the other end of the floor.
“If I miss my first two shots in a game, that third one I take is going to be huge for me in terms of my confidence,” Bowen said. “Somebody like Allen or Carmelo, they can miss their first 11 or 12 shots and they’ll still keep shooting like they were on fire, because they know that sooner or later they’re going to get into their rhythm.”
