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SAN ANTONIO, Texas: Michael Finley and Tony Parker each scored 22
points and the reigning National Basketball Association champion San
Antonio Spurs beat Houston 109-88 Sunday for a seventh win in a row.
Finley made 9-of-13 shots for the game and
scored 18 points in the first half as the Spurs grabbed a 66-48
half-time lead and coasted from there.
“It wasn’t easy,” Finley said. “I just
had good looks at the basket and I made the most out of those
opportunities.”
Finley, who had been slumping, is hitting nearly
70 percent from the field, shooting 31-of-45, in his past four
games.
“I stay confident, continue to work hard,”
Finley said. “I was going through a little bit. I lost confidence.
Now I’m coming back. At this time of year you have to step your
game up. I took it upon myself to step up my game.”
The Spurs improved to 51-23 and moved half a
game ahead of New Orleans in quest of the top record in the Western
Conference and a home-court edge throughout the West playoffs.
“It was a solid game, a solid win,” Parker
said. “But we have to stay focused because we have a lot of games
coming up.”
The Rockets, who leaped from 10th to first in
the West with the NBA’s second-longest win streak earlier this
month, have fallen to a share of fifth by going 3-4 since, level
with Phoenix on 49-24.
“You just have to be solid at both ends to
beat those guys,” Rockets forward Shane Battier said. “You have
to execute and we had a lack of execution on both ends. And you
can’t win in San Antonio without execution on both ends.”
San Antonio sank 25-of-39 from the field in the
first half, a 64-percent accuracy rate, and made only one turnover
in obtaining the huge lead, with Finley the hottest of the Spurs’
deadly shooters.
“He was on fire, and we went to him quite a
bit,” Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. “He was shooting very
aggressively and shooting quickly. He was feeling good.”
Luis Scola scored 24 points to lead the Rockets,
while the Spurs kept Tracy McGrady to 5-of-22 shooting and fellow
Houston backcourt starter Rafer Alston to 4-of-16 from the field.
Each guard scored only 13 points.
Bruce Bowen shut down McGrady most of the game,
the playmaking guard feeling the absence of Chinese star center Yao
Ming with a foot injury that has ended his NBA season.
“Without Yao, the onus falls on Tracy,”
Bowen said. “He’s going to create a lot of attention that causes
us to prepare for him the way we did today.”
-- AFP
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