So close! Here’s what Mitch Johnson, Stephon Castle, Chris Paul and Harrison Barnes said after the Spurs’ home loss to the Cavaliers.
SAN ANTONIO — The San Antonio Spurs lost to the Cleveland Cavaliers at home 114-13, led by Devin Vassell’s 24 points. San Antonio lost the regular-season series to the Cavs 0-2.
Stephon Castle scored 22 points and handed out 11 assists. Chris Paul had nine points and eight assists. Sandro Mamukelashili finished with five and five rebounds, and Bismack Biyombo recorded 10 rebounds. Julian Champagnie finished with 15, and Keldon Johnson scored seven.
The Spurs are 32-45 this season and will visit the Blazers on Sunday night.
Here’s a sample of what the Spurs said after the game.
Mitch Johnson:
“They fought their butts off. It’s about as rewarding of a loss, as agonizing as losing is as you feel. They (Cavs) made 22 threes. They crushed us early making shots. They probably punished some decisions we made as a coaching staff in terms of some schematic stuff and that’s what good teams do sometimes. Tip your cap to them. And these guys have found a way to not go away numerous times and that just speaks to them individually and collectively as a group. You wish that ball would’ve bounced in for their sake because they put so much into this deal, but that team’s playing for the number one seat in the east and it’s very rewarding as a coach at times to have that type of fight in your team.”
“That team (Cavs) got 62 wins over there. We played them pretty well maybe a week and a half ago. At any point we could have let go of the rope, but we kept fighting and got a few games left to keep trying to build and keep learning and build up confidence.”
“I thought we’d just stick to our game plan. Really first half, they made a lot of shots. We weren’t fully executed on our gameplay, but second half we kind of picked it up, ramped it up defensively, caused a couple turnovers, limited them on the offensive glass. That kind of helped us get back in it. So I mean, I was happy with the fight we showed to kind of pull that game in.”
“I thought between the first game I thought we had some stretches there. We executed, kind of put ourselves in good position in this game. In the second half, we did a better job of fighting, getting back into it… but the deficit that we created in the first half, I think that’s where the growth opportunity is for us. Avoid those situations.”
Kenny Atkinson: