Injury-Plagued Spurs Stumble in Double OT Against Sixers, Facing Historic Low in Season’s Close
The Spurs are limping towards the finish line as the 2023-24 season draws to an end following Monday’s double overtime loss to Philadelphia 133-126 at the Frost Bank Center.
The Spurs were without Devin Vassell and Jeremy Sochan; both are out due to injury for the rest of the season, in Monday’s loss. Keldon Johnson returned after missing three games with a sprained left foot but exited after turning his left ankle with 7:28 left in the game. He is likely done for the season as well.
The game was close throughout but the Silver and Black had no answers for Philly guard Tyrese Maxey who torched the Spurs for 52 points including the game-tying layup with two seconds remaining in regulation to send the game into overtime.
VDub had another monster game with 33 points, 18 rebounds, 6 assists, and 7 blocks. He was one turnover away however from the bad side of a triple-double with 9 turnovers. Malachi Branham chipped in 22 points in the loss for the Spurs.
“They [the Spurs] were great. Double overtime game. They’re learning a lot. The difference in that game was the fact that [the 76ers] could dial up their defensive pressure. 25 turnovers, which resulted in 35 points. Shouldn’t even be in the ball game if you do that. That’s been one of our deals all year. When that pressure is dialed up, defensively, we have a little bit of a problem with that. Tonight showed. They did everything they could until Philly did a great job dialing up and it was hard to run anything or get anything done. That’s the name of the game. Nothing else is really important.”, said Coach Popovich following the loss.
The Spurs are now 19-59 and still last in the Western Conference with four games remaining. To the team’s credit, despite the lackluster overall season, the squad has played hard throughout and have shown signs of improvement as of late.
“We’re always going to be competitive, for sure. We’re looking at the big picture. We’ve been eliminated from playoff contention a while ago, so it’s always just been about continuing to get better this year, continue to try and build chemistry with each other, both offensively and defensively. Make sure that we’re working toward the right things, building good habits, things like that we can carry throughout the rest of the season and into next year as well. We got a lot of main guys out, but everybody stays ready. A lot of people have things to prove as well and continue to try to improve everybody’s game. We’re going to fight every night, for sure. Obviously, we’ve been in a lot of close ones lately, so that’s definitely a good sign. But we let this one get away from us, so that definitely hurts. But we got two coming up, back-to-back coming up, so we just got to learn from this one and then be ready to go to Memphis and get a win.”, said Spurs Guard Trey Jones after Monday’s loss.
This iteration of the Spurs are fighting against history as they look to avoid setting the worst record in franchise history. That dubious honor belongs to the 1996-97 Spurs squad that went 20-62.
Upcoming Games:
Tue, Apr 9 @ **Memphis (27-51) 7pm
Wed, Apr 10 @ *(3)OK City (53-25) 7pm
Fri, Apr 12 vs *(1)Denver (54-24) 7pm
Sun, Apr 14 vs **Detroit (13-65) 230pm
*-denotes team’s current Conference standing.
**-denotes team has been eliminated from playoffs
