LaMarcus Aldridge 3pts 4reb 1blk

[OldSchoolDude]

We shut him down!!!

The D was really impressive tonight.   Smart and G-Will were rock solid ... BUT ... Time Lord was awesome tonight, looking great on both ends.   Some of those dunks looked like he may have froze time to go up and get the ball.  His dunks were vicious!  And 6 blocks! 

[Surferdad]

Give credit to Dan Theis for shutting LMA down early.

[OldSchoolDude]

Theis was good and did a stand up job, but over all I felt that the Spurs attacked the paint more with him on the court then they did with Time Lord.  Plus we've been waiting for signs that Robert Williams III could play up to his potential.  I was seeing Texas A&M Williams out there tonight.

[DefenseWinsChamps]

There was a moment early in the fourth when Aldridge got the ball against Williams in his sweet spot on the left extended block. He took his dribble, knocked Williams back, and went to turn over his right should for his patented fade away.

But he was scared to shoot it with Williams on him. So he passed it out.

That's obviously not gonna happen every time, and Aldridge will have better games against us in the future, but Williams' ability to take away a player's best moves is remarkable. If he could only do that on ball consistently and get comfortable with helpside rotations ...

Eh, I'll say it ... he could be a defensive MVP candidate.

[Who]

I only got to see a little bit of the game but from what I saw it had little to do with Theis and everything to do with the team defense that helped Theis and closed down space around Aldridge.

Maybe things were different in other parts of the game ... I don't know. But from what I saw, other people (namely the perimeter guys) deserve the lion's share of the praise for shutting down LMA.

[CelticsPoetry]

Brad put it well, something along the lines of: I'm not gonna act like it was just our game plan that shut him down, our guys played very hard, but that doesnt always mean the opposing players wont score