Major Key For San Antonio: Limit Offensive Mistakes
This is a pretty easy major key for a Gregg Popovich team, but if the Spurs can limit their turnovers and bad shots on offense they’ll find this game to be a lot easier on the defensive end. Unsurprisingly, the Spurs are the tenth-best team at not turning the ball over this season.
San Antonio has found ways to play punishing defense even while Pau Gasol starts games, which Popovich deserves some sort of medal for. However they do it, stopping Giannis is going to be something every team strives to do from now on.
If the Spurs prevent him from running all over them after blocks and steals, they’ll have a far better shot of doing that. Giannis will get his points now–even without fast breaks, he can sometimes be unstoppable on the offensive end.
Milwaukee can’t afford an inefficient scoring night from the Greek Freak though, not against these Spurs. Throwing Kawhi on him might be the one way the Spurs could really stop Giannis, but teams have been finding ways to keep Kawhi away from their main action on offense this season.