Murray’s injury leaves big opening at point
ATLANTA — The Spurs’ team charter flight departed San Antonio on a dreary afternoon, bound for Atlanta and another preseason game at Georgia Tech’s McCamish Pavilion.
Somewhere over Mississippi, it became apparent if it hadn’t been already: Life goes on, even with Dejounte Murray out for the season with a torn right anterior cruciate ligament.
“It is a devastating injury to a guy who was making strides,” forward Rudy Gay said. “We have to rally around each other and figure out how to make it happen.”
That could be a job easier said than done for a Spurs team that had come to view Murray as a secret weapon of sorts.
The 22-year-old had proved himself one of the NBA’s top rebounding and defensive point guards in his first two seasons, and he had added a mid-range jumper over the summer.
But Murray collapsed on a drive in Sunday’s preseason loss to the Rockets, his third NBA season over before it had begun. Murray’s ill-timed knee injury brings an unwanted shift in the Spurs’ focus ahead of their Oct. 17 opener against Minnesota.
With two preseason games left — Wednesday in Atlanta and Friday at Orlando — there’s an urgency to find a starting point guard.
“I think we’re all trying to work out what pieces of the puzzle go where,” guard Patty Mills said. “We’ve got a couple more games to do that.”
Options? Mills, White, Forbes
With one of their most important puzzle pieces now lost between couch cushions, the Spurs are under no delusion the final picture will look the same.
Murray already was facing the challenge of sliding into the Hall of Fame hightops once occupied by franchise icon Tony Parker. Now the Spurs need someone to fill the shoes of the player who was trying to fill Parker’s. And there is no ready-made replacement on the roster.
Mills is the team’s most veteran option, but the 10th-year pro is more comfortable coming off the bench and better suited to playing off the ball.
Derrick White, the Spurs’ 2017 first-round pick, is another potential option. The former Colorado standout has appeared in only 17 NBA games and isn’t a natural for the point position, but he has turned heads in training camp.
Another candidate to earn minutes at the lead guard slot is Bryn Forbes, who has established himself as a deadly shooter in two NBA seasons but is still learning the ropes at the point.
It is up to coach Gregg Popovich to find some sort of point guard alchemy that works. He says this process will be ongoing.
“We’ll figure out how we want to move forward,” Popovich said. “Nothing is in stone.”
As it was last season, when the Spurs only had the services of AllStar forward Kawhi Leonard for nine games, Popovich has issued a “no whining” edict in the face of the team’s latest debilitating injury.
“We just carry on,” Popovich said.
Too late to get Parker back?
In a biting bit of bad luck, the point guard minutes Parker left for Charlotte to seek just opened up in his old stomping grounds of San Antonio.
Mills — now the team’s longesttenured player after offseason departures of Parker, Manu Ginobili, Leonard and Danny Green — believes it is his job to help to get White, 24, and Forbes, 25, prepared for what awaits.
“It’s on us as leaders to make sure we get everybody that is going to fill Dejounte’s shoes ready, knowing we are going to need them,” Mills said.
That begins in Atlanta, when the Spurs take the floor for the first time this preseason without Murray on the ball.
A trip that once might have served to help the Spurs sand out the rough spots a week before the start of the season has now become a cattle call for a starting point guard.
Whoever earns the position will be the Spurs’ third openingday point guard in as many seasons, following Parker and Murray.
Make no mistake. The Spurs will miss their young guard in the days and months to come. Murray averaged 8.1 points, 5.7 rebounds, 2.9 assists and 1.2 steals per game last season, while being named to the NBA’s All-Defensive team.
He seemed poised for a bigger breakout this season. That will have to wait until at least 2019-20.
“Pop gave him the ball and said, ‘Lead this team,’ ” Gay said. “We have a lot of talent. We have a deep bench. We have a lot of guys who can do a lot of things, so I guess we are just going to have to prove it.”
When the Spurs’ charter flight at last landed Tuesday, Murray was not on it.
Life — and the NBA season — go on without him, much to the Spurs’ chagrin.