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OKC holds off Spurs, evens series in wild finish
- Updated: May 3, 2016
SAN ANTONIO — It was pandemonium when the final buzzer sounded at AT&T Center on Monday night. A chaotic Thunder inbound mishap gave the Spurs every chance to walk away with a 2-0 series lead, yet San Antonio couldn’t convert in the closing seconds of a breathless exchange. And just like that, Oklahoma City had stolen home-court advantage, tying the series 1-1 with a 98-97 Game 2 victory.
“We showed great resiliency,” said Thunder center Steven Adams, who had a monster game with 17 rebounds to go with 12 points, including some rim-shattering dunks on a couple picture-perfect pick and rolls. “We came out and actually tried. That’s pretty much it, we actually tried this time.”
After subpar efforts in Game 1, Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant combined for 57 points on Monday. On the other side, San Antonio got another superstar performance from LaMarcus Aldridge, who finished with 41 points. Unfortunately for the Spurs, nobody else could do much of anything. All told, the Spurs shot just 42.6 percent from the field and 26 percent from 3. Kawhi Leonard couldn’t get any rhythm, scoring just 11 points.
“They were in attack mode, which one [would] expect, but I thought that our organization offensively was really poor and it fueled their transition offense,” Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. “That was the main problem.”
Here are four things to know from the Thunder’s Game 2 win:
1. Final play madness
With the Thunder up by one in the closing seconds of the game, Dion Waiters threw a wild pass that led to a turnover. But that wasn’t the story. Waiters had difficulty inbounding the ball, and with a five-second call looming, he very blatantly put his forearm into Manu Ginobili to clear space. Check it out here:
Somehow, the official standing right on top of the play, staring right at Waiters, didn’t call this. Lead official Ken Mauer said after the game what everyone already knew, that it shoud’ve been a foul on Waiters and the Spurs should’ve gotten the ball.
Yes, the Spurs got the ball anyway as Waiters’ pass was intercepted, but the final sequence was far more chaotic than it needed to be. San Antonio, which was …
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