Pounding The Rock

Photo by Andrew D. BernsteinNBAE via The Spurs first home in San Antonio When I first joined Pounding The Rock, I wrote about my earliest experiences with the Spurs. My childhood was peppered with trips to HemisFair Arena during the second decade of the San Antonio Spurs. HemisFair was a sight to behold, and Episode 25 of the Spurs docuseries The Ring of the Rowel does a wonderful job of raising those memories back into focus. There’s a wonderful clip of Red McCombs talking about how the city supported the use of the space as well as the expansion of the structure...

Scott Wachter-USA TODAY Sports The Spurs head to Beantown for a late-season match-up with the defending Eastern Conference Champion Celtics The Celtics find themselves in a difficult place. After weathering the early storm brought on by the Ime Udoka situation ahead of the season, Boston was in possession of the NBA’s best record for much of the season. They’ve stumbled a bit since the All Star Break though, and are 7-5 to this point in March. A particular 3-game skid early in the month was all it took for the surging Milwaukee Bucks, on their tails for most of the...

Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports Second round draft prospects to monitor this weekend Is anyone else’s bracket busted? With the final #1 seeds, Houston and Alabama, going down in the Sweet Sixteen to Miami and San Diego State, most of the favorites to win the tournament have been eliminated. This is the first time in the history of the tournament that not a single first seeded squad will be advancing to the Elite Eight. The NCAA Championship seems like anyone could grab it at this point. With a lot of the higher-seeded teams falling, that also means a lot of...

Photo by Patrick Smith/ The Spurs season may be all but over, but you should keep watching. It’s getting to that point in this season that it’s hard to know if there’s anything left to learn about this Spurs team. It’s quite possible we won’t see a complete lineup again, and this game may have been proof. It wasn’t on either end of a back-to-back, so it really didn’t warrant any “injury management”, but Gregg Popovich did it anyways by sitting Devin Vassell, Zach Collins and Romeo Langford (I’m saying Jeremy Sochan’s issues are real), while Keldon...

Photo by Patrick Smith/ Highlights from the Spurs third-straight loss The Spurs have struggled to score the ball in their first two trips in a 4-game road trip. They haven’t reached 100 points in a game since they defeated the Hawks on March 19. They broke that streak in Washington, scoring 124 points, but the defense could not slow down the Wizards offensive onslaught in a 136-124 loss. The flood gates opened in the 4th quarter, when Washington’s Delon Wright took over, leading the Wiz on a 22-8 run that sealed the game. The Wizards had four players score 20+...

Photos by Michael Gonzales/NBAE via The Little General turns 58 today Avery Johnson made the final shot that earned the San Antonio Spurs their first ever NBA Championship. He had previously been cut by the team on two occasions (once at Christmas). Time and again, Johnson had to prove himself worthy of playing point guard for the Silver & Black. Alongside David Robinson, the fiesta era Spurs duo are forever emblazoned in the annals of Alamo City sports history. Johnson went on to coach earning himself Coach of the Year in 2006 while anchoring the Dallas Mavericks. He...

Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports San Antonio and Washington played a close game for three quarters but the Spurs simply couldn’t get enough stops in the end. The Spurs put up a decent fight in their visit to Washington despite missing key players. Keldon Johnson dropped 30 points and pulled down 10 rebounds but San Antonio ended up losing to the Wizards 136-124 in a matchup that didn’t feature a lot of defense but was often close and mostly fun. It didn’t take more than a glance at the court at tip-off to notice the Wizards had a size advantage on the shorthanded...

Daniel Dunn-USA TODAY Sports The Spurs were having a good showing for three quarters but fell apart in the fourth. The San Antonio Spurs are in D.C. after back-to-back blowout losses against New Orleans and Milwaukee. Despite facing a depth issue with injuries on the team, the Spurs are in Washington with hopes of being the Wizards, who have been average this season in the west. Keldon is in the game tonight, and the Spurs are looking to break their losing streak this evening. Observations Mamu continues to be impressive. He is smart with his passes, good on defense, a...

Photo by Ronald Cortes/ The Spurs are in D.C. to face Kristaps Porzingis and the Wizards Welcome to the Game Thread. Veterans of the Game Thread know how we do things around here, but for all you newbies we have a few rules. Our community guidelines apply and basically say be cool, no personal attacks, don’t troll and don’t swear too much. One of the tasks I have to do to set up a game thread is to pick a photo to run with the article. Writers at PTR have access to a great library of images from really talented pros, but the main criteria is that we want to use a...

Bill Streicher-USA TODAY Sports Sacramento and Philly have consistently disappointed their fans, but that could change this year. By now, many Sixers fans have accepted the fact that as soon as the playoffs start, what can go wrong, will go wrong. Meanwhile, the Kings have a postseason drought that’s old enough to drive. However, both teams could make a deep run this year — assuming this article doesn’t jinx them, of course. So, it’s time to discuss these two cursed franchises, and what better place to start than those pesky beam lighters? Sactown: cute...

Daniel Dunn-USA TODAY Sports Spurs look to bounce back from two straight road blowouts The San Antonio Spurs had to play with an incomplete roster all season, but in the last two games they’ve been noticeably thin. That lack of depth has cost them in back-to-back blowout losses against potential playoff teams in New Orleans and Milwaukee. Their most recent loss came in the form of a 130-94 loss to the Bucks, where they couldn’t get it going on offense nor defense. They will have a chance at redemption against a Washington Wizards squad that might be hurdling towards...

She really doesn’t see wins and losses like her dad I have to admit, I have not suffered through the the San Antonio Spurs 2022-2023 season as much as I originally imagined. Watching the development of players has been a treat. Injuries hampered what might have been exponential growth and the timely pouring of a solid foundation. The good news is, there’s always next year. Or the next year...or the one after that. That is one thing the Spurs have proven time and again over the two-plus decades with Pop at the helm. It’s never over if you just won’t quit. During Spring...

Photo by Garrett W. Ellwood/NBAE via That time the Celtics decided to double prime Manu, and it didn’t go too well. In a recent sit down between former Boston Celtics Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce and current big three Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown and Marcus Smart, the two legends had a hilarious story about a time they played the Spurs, and their game plan to trap Manu Ginobili backfired in about the worst possible way. As the story goes, Pierce is guarding Ginobili, who has “been on a tear” heading into the game, and Garnett had Matt Bonner but was helping off...

Photo by Patrick McDermott/ A predictable loss to one of the league’s best Alright. Well. So, I’m just going to roll the TV into the classroom today and we’re just gonna pop in the “Spurs lose big, but it’s fine” VHS that we’ve already watched a bunch this year. Is that cool? If you want to put your heads down and take a nap on your desk until next period, that’s fine by me. We can just move it along. Nothing to see here. This game felt like watching a dog get a brand new plush toy. They’re so excited at first to be confronted with it that they don’t...

Jeff Hanisch-USA TODAY Sports It was another ugly game for the Spurs, but like always, highlights can be found if you dig deep enough. I know I like to say highlights can be found even in the worst games, but this one is pushing it. Although they got some starters back and weren’t quite the skeleton crew that was put forth the night before in New Orleans, the Spurs suffered a blowout loss for the second night in a row, this time at the hands of the league-leading Milwaukee Bucks, and highlights were admittedly hard to come by. Overall, the Spurs shot just just...