DEROZAN QUESTIONABLE FOR TONIGHT’S GAME.
The Spurs on Wednesday listed forward Demar Derozan as questionable for tonight’s nationally televised game against the new-look Houston Rockets after he missed the last two games for personal reasons.
Derozan averages 21.2 points and 7.0 assists in 34.4 minutes per game, all team highs. He left the Spurs to be with his ailing father after pumping in 38 points in a 125-122 win over the Timberwolves in overtime Saturday in Minneapolis.
Before the Spurs beat the Thunder 112-102 Tuesday in Oklahoma City, coach Gregg Popovich said there was a “good chance” Derozan would return to San Antonio on Wednesday but that the team wanted him to stay with his father “as long as he has to.”
“He’s in a real difficult situation with his dad,” Popovich said.
Derozan has led the Spurs in scoring three times this season and in assists five times. In the win over the Timberwolves in OT, he had 13 points after the third quarter to match his most points in three seasons with the Spurs.
“Demar is one of those guys who can just get you a bucket when you need one,” Spurs center Jakob Poeltl said. “When you have like a little bit of a slump, you can put it in his hands, put him in an (isolation) situation, put him in a pick-androll, and he’s going to get you a good shot out of it more often than not.”
In Derozan’s absence, Lonnie Walker IV looked to score more. The third-year pro followed up his season-best 25-point performance in Sunday’s 96-88 loss at Minnesota with a team-high 24 points against the Thunder.
For the season, Walker is averaging a career-best 14.1 points per game.
“I am such an unselfish player that sometimes it gets the best of me,” Walker said. “But these past two games with Demar not being here, I knew it was time for me to step up and take that role.”
Popovich said he wants Walker to continue to be aggressive offensively even after Derozan returns.
“He doesn’t lack for anyone repeating that to him,” Popovich
said. “There are like nine coaches, and we are all saying the same thing to him. We are trying to make it a habit — take no prisoners.”
Young roster excels at ball security so far
It just doesn’t add up.
The Spurs have their youngest roster since Popovich became coach in 1996, with an average age of 25.5, including nine players under 25.
They are running a new, uptempo offense that requires snap decisions.
They played just three preseason games and haven’t had much time to practice since the season started.
Yet here they are, leading the NBA in fewest turnovers per game with a 10.2 average that
would be a league record if the season ended today.
Even Popovich is struggling to make sense of it.
“If I knew, I would bottle it,” he said, when asked why the team has protected the ball so well.
“It’s not like we’ve done ‘noturnover’ drills,” he added. “They have just taken care of the ball really well.”
A big factor in the Spurs’ ability to protect the ball has been the play of Derozan, who is on track for a career high in assists per game while turning the ball over just 1.8 times per 100 possessions, the best mark of his 12-year carer.
“He’s out there being a leader, getting other guys involved, attracting a lot of attention from the defense,” Poeltl said.
But even without Derozan,
the Spurs have valued the ball.
The Spurs registered 26 assists and committed just four turnovers in Tuesday’s game. It marked the first time in 35 years they have committed 10 or fewer turnovers in six consecutive games, Spurs broadcaster/analyst Dan Weiss wrote on Twitter.
The Spurs have turned the ball over 10 or fewer times in a league-low eight games this season. Their 2.50 assist-toturnover ratio also leads the league.
“We’ve done nothing special,” Popovich said. “We have called a few more plays to get them a little more organized, so it’s probably a bit less frantic than in the past. That’s all I can think of, really.”