So it begins where it ended.
Tim Duncan once again had the opportunity to tie the game in its closing seconds, just as he did in the first overtime of that painful Suns game 1 playoff loss last year. This time the result was different. Duncan missed the shot and the Suns hung on to start the season 1-0 and give Terry Porter his first victory (and technical foul) as the Suns head coach.
Amare was dominant in the fourth quarter, with 11 of his team-high 22 points, including a vicious dunk to put the Suns up 5 with 1:46 to play.
The Spurs were led by Tony Parker and Tim Duncan who each collected 32 points. However it wasn’t enough as the rest of the Spurs starters could only muster together 10 points.
Greg Popovich once again decided to play Hack-A-Shaq including early on in the game, earning a smile from the Big Aristotle. But as the game progressed the Big Cactus took offense to the intentional fouls, sending Ime Udoka to the floor after he played Hack-A-Shaq. Earlier this month Shaquille O’Neil called Greg Popovich’s Hack-A-Shaq tactic “cowardly,” in situations where his team had a sizable lead.
The Diesel hauled in 13 boards and scored 15 points, including 5-8 shooting from the free-throw line.
After one game, the new style of coach Porter has already had some stark contrasts to that of former head coach Mike D’Antoni. For one, Porter played 10 players in the game as opposed to D’Antoni’s normal 8, splitting time between starter Matt Barnes and reserve Grant Hill evenly at 19 minutes apiece.
Porter also seemed to stray from the pick-n-roll late in the game, instead opting to go inside to Stoudemire late in the fourth who was able to convert the and-1, drawing a foul from former teammate Kurt Thomas.
One barely noticeable difference came when Terry Porter decided to call a timeout after Tony Parker knocked down his first of two free-throws to tie the game at 94 with 3:08 remaining, a situation in which coach D’Antoni likely would not have called the timeout. Icing Parker resulted in him missing his second free toss and a STAT made jump shot at the other end.
The Suns return to the Valley tomorrow evening for their home opener against the Chris Paul led New Orleans Hornets. Tip-off is 7:30pm on TNT.