San Antonio Spurs achieve the inevitable; Sweep Utah Jazz out off the playoffs with an 87-81 win in Game 4
After three silent game, Argentinean sniper Manu Ginobili finally got it going on the offensive end, racking up 17 points to help the San Antonio Spurs sweep past the Utah Jazz with a 87-81 win and to clinch this Western Conference first round playoff series on Monday night here at the Energy Solutions Arena.
Tim Duncan also played a helping hand by recording 11 points to go along with 3 blocked shots and 5 rebounds in the game. Tony Parker added 11 points in the contest.
Tiago Splitter, in his second game back, continued to play well to sign off with 10 points off the bench while Gary Neal had 11 points.
Jazz decided to play a big line up of Gordon Hayward, Derrick Favors and Paul Millsap, among the starters and even though it helped them in out-rebounding the Spurs 57-43, it did not help them much in stopping the team San Antonio in winning this one.
Al Jefferson played well for his 26 points on a 13-of-19 shooting night while Favors and Millsap recorded 16 and 10 points respectively. Devin Harris racked up 19 points but it took him a total of 17 attempts to get to that total. Hayward failed to open up his scoring account in the matchup.
The bench scoring from Utah let them down in the ball game, getting outscored by Spurs 57-10 in that aspect of the game.
Spurs got off and running in the contest as they held an 11-4 advantage early in the first period but the Jazz responded back with a 15-4 spurt to take their first lead of the game. The Spurs put an end to that run with a jump shot from Ginobili and ended the proceedings in the first quarter, with a 7-0 burst to snatch back the lead, making the score 22-19.
The second quarter saw the Spurs take their lead quickly into double figures courtesy of 14-3 run. The advantage remained above the double figure mark for most part of the second period, however by the half way mark, Jazz were able to make the score 42-50.
Spurs never looked troubled in the second half and were able to get their advantage back to double digits, holding it there till the 6:18 mark in the third. The home side, desperate to hang on in the series, managed to put together a 10-0 run to cut the lead down to 3 but to close out the proceedings, Spurs went on a 7-0 burst to get the advantage back to 10.
San Antonio carried that momentum and opened the last frame on a 13-2 run to apparently put the game to bed. However, the Jazz were fighting for their lives, and responded back with a 19-2 run to turn this match into a two possession game, 79-83.
The experienced Spurs however knew it all and a layup from Ginobili with 18.9 seconds on the clock made it 85-79 and that pretty much wrapped up the series.
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