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Jazz helped draw Spurs' blueprint
Roles reversed as teams get ready for their first playoff series since 1998
By JOHNNY LUDDEN
San Antonio Express-News
May 20, 2007, 1:34AM
SAN ANTONIO ─ This is what Tim Duncan remembers from the last time he saw
the Utah Jazz in the playoffs: He sprained his left ankle, tried to play on
it the next game and it wasn't too much fun.
The Spurs lost and Duncan left with a new target in his sights.
"They were our hump team," Duncan said. "They were the team that was great
around that time and we knew we had to get past them to get where we wanted
to get.
"I expected to see them for years to come."
It took nine years, but the Jazz are standing in the Spurs' way again when
the Western Conference finals open Sunday at the AT&T Center.
Utah's shorts hang a little longer these days and most of the names have
changed. Since the Jazz eliminated them in the second round of Duncan's
rookie season in 1998, the Spurs have reigned at or near the top of the
league while winning three championships. Utah, meanwhile, has become a
team of young party crashers looking to break into the NBA Finals.
David Robinson will be in attendance today, but sitting across from the
Spurs' bench, not on it. Karl Malone now runs a logging company in Arkansas.
John Stockton is living out his retirement in Spokane, Wash.
Utah's pick-and-roll is now run with nearly the same efficiency by Deron
Williams and Carlos Boozer.
But it's still the Spurs and Jazz, and that's usually good enough to get
everyone to sharpen their elbows.
"I expect it to be a big-time physical game," Bruce Bowen said, "between two
teams that know one another pretty well."
That's a good thing for the Spurs considering they had only a short film
session and brief walk-through after completing their second-round series
against Phoenix late Friday. But in coach Gregg Popovich's mind, the Spurs
began preparing more than a decade ago.
"From the first time I came into the league I always felt watching all the
teams, Utah executed better than anybody else," Popovich said. "Through my
years in the league, they've always been a team I've looked to as far as a
group executing, night in and night out, at both ends of the court."
Popovich used the Jazz as his blueprint to build the Spurs, seeking
tough-minded players willing to embrace his defense-first philosophy.
Since the Jazz ended his rookie year, Duncan has led the Spurs to a 27-7
record against them that included an 18-game winning streak.
"We go down there with the mindset that what happened before is behind us,"
Boozer said. "We're obviously a different team than a lot of those losses.
"We're looking forward to making some new history."
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/4819636.html
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