Nets running out of luck?

SAN ANTONIO - Will the San Antonio Spurs put the New Jersey Nets out of their misery or will they prolong the agony?

The battlefront returns to the Alamo City as the Spurs go for the clincher against the Nets in Game 6 of the National Basketball Association (NBA) Finals at the SBC Center here this morning (Manila time).

The Spurs could’ve closed out the best-of-7 series in four but the Nets got lucky in Games 2 and 4, twice escaping via hairline cliffhangers. San Antonio would’ve won Game 2 if only Stephen Jackson hit his triple try at the buzzer and Game 4 would’ve gone into overtime if Manu Ginobili sank his trey, also at the buzzer.

With the series tied at two wins apiece, New Jersey coach Byron Scott desperately tried to defend the Nets homecourt in Game 5 last Friday. San Antonio, however, wouldn’t oblige.

Now, the Nets are in a 1-3 hole with the daunting task of having to beat the Spurs twice in a row on the road to capture the title that eluded them last year. No team has ever come back from that deficit to bag a championship so the odds are against a New Jersey reversal.

Scott isn’t fazed. Neither is power forward Kenyon Martin who played sick for 38 minutes in Game 5. Both vow a fight to the finish. Scott said it’s not an impossible situation. He’s not thinking of a Game 7 yet. His priority is to survive Game 6. Martin said the Nets don’t know how to quit-the word "surrender" isn’t in their vocabulary.

For the Spurs, coach Gregg Popovich is shutting out the possibility of a winner-take-all Game 7 where anything can happen, no matter which team hosts. He’s not taking any chances. Popovich is going all out for a win in Game 6. No sense allowing the dangerous Nets a ray of hope.

The Spurs are dedicating the Finals to David Robinson, the 37-year-old center who’s retiring at the end of the playoffs. A13-year veteran, Robinson was the league’s Rookie of the Year in 1990, the Defensive Player of the Year in 1992, and Most Valuable Player in 1995. The three-time Olympian led the NBA in scoring in 1994, averaging 29.8 points, and once shot 71 in a contest.

For over a decade, Robinson has been the symbol of San Antonio basketball. He epitomizes the gentleman athlete, a hero on and off the court. Robinson has donated $9 Million to finance the Carver Academy, a Judeo-Christian school from pre-kindergarten to the eighth grade in San Antonio and gives away 50 tickets to charity for every Spurs home game.

Robinson slowed down considerably this past regular season where he averaged 8.5 points and 7.9 rebounds in 64 games. In the Finals, he has loomed large in Popovich’s system. Robinson is averaging 10.4 points, 5.4 rebounds, and 1.2 blocked shots but more importantly, plays a vital role in the Spurs’ defensive rotation.

San Antonio and Dallas posted identical 60-22 records in the regular season but the Spurs claimed the top seed in the playoffs by virtue of the statistical tiebreak. It lost the first game of the opening round of the playoffs to Phoenix in overtime but held on to win the series in six. The Spurs and the Los Angeles Lakers were tied at two wins apiece before San Antonio swept the last two outings to also clinch the second round series in six. In the third round, the Spurs lost the first game to Dallas but bounced back to win in six.

The road to the Finals wasn’t as rocky for the Nets who crushed Milwaukee in six and blanked both Boston and Detroit to arrange the San Antonio showdown. New Jersey entered the Finals with a 10-game winning streak.

Popovich said defense will decide the team to succeed the Lakers on the NBA throne.

"The teams that won out historically have been very, very good defensive clubs," he said. "They were pretty well-rounded. They could play in the halfcourt, they could run, usually the games became more halfcourt than running games but what didn’t change was the winner was a good defensive club. Here you have two good defensive clubs in the Finals and one of them is going to win.

"When the Lakers won three in a row, they were excellent defensively. The Bulls were excellent defensively. When we win, we are excellent defensively. That’s the way it is."

Scott said bringing back the series to San Antonio was a moral victory for the Nets.

"I think everybody expected this series to be over or would not get back to San Antonio," said Scott. "The longer it goes, the better chance that we have obviously because we were such underdogs,nobody gave us a real shot of winning this thing, except ourselves. We really felt from the time this series started that we matched up pretty well with San Antonio. We thought we had a good chance to win the championship. The longer it goes along, our confidence continues to grow and we continue to believe that we can win."

Nets forward Richard Jefferson, who shot 19 points in a losing effort in Game 5, warned the Spurs not to take New Jersey lightly and predicted a wild Game 6.

"Both teams are due for a breakout where we score 100 something points because that’s the way we want to play," said the sophomore pro. :"They are doing a great job of getting back on defense. We are doing a great job of closing out on their shooters. Their fastbreak is underrated, too, with Jackson and Tony Parker and Ginobili. Those guys want to get out and run and then you have Tim Duncan and Malik Rose trailing. That’s a pretty good break. There’s no need to be prideful. There’s no need to just try and force offense. Defense is what’s going to win."

If the Nets’ luck holds out in Game 6, the clincher will be played here Wednesday night (Thursday morning, Manila time).