Spurs Advance to Western Finals to Face Grizzlies

“You live by the three, you die by the three” Charles Barkley’s favorite saying goes. It happened in Game Six to the Golden State Warriors on Thursday Night as they fell to the San Antonio Spurs. In the last two minutes, two Tony Parker threes found the bottom of the net, while a three by Klay Thompson and another by Stephen Curry went half way down and popped back out. Had those shots gone the other way, so would the game.

With about 2:00 to go and the Spurs up by three, Parker drilled one from the left corner to make it 85-79. Then Thompson’s three from the top of the circle rimmed out. The rebound went off the Spurs out of bounds. On the ensuing play, Curry had an open look from the top of the circle and it too rimmed out. Then Parker drilled one from the right corner to put the Spurs up 88-79 with 1:15 left and that ended any Warriors threat.

Parker is not known as a three-point shooter, but at the big moment the veteran point guard came up huge. Thompson and Curry are among the best three-point shooters in the game, but will have an entire off-season to think about the last ones that would not go down.

Now the Spurs will go on to face the Memphis Grizzlies on Sunday in Game one at home. Memphis dispatched the defending Western Conference champion Oklahoma City Thunder in five games.

BetOnline has odds on the series:

The Grizzlies are +110 for the series while the Spurs are -130.

For winning the NBA World Championship,  the Spurs are +400 while the Grizzlies are +600 on Oddsmaker.

This series should be a war in the paint with Marc Gasol and Zach Randolph of the Grizzlies going against the Spurs with Tim Duncan and Tiago Splitter. That’s not to say there won’t be some great guard play with Mike Conley and Tayshaun Prince of Memphis going up against Tony Parker and Manu Ginobli of the Spurs. But watch out for the Spurs Kawhi Leonard to have an impact on this series. He seems to come up with a big play when they need one.

For all you experts who ripped Memphis for trading Rudy Gay in mid-season, what do you have to say now?

For the Warriors, the future looks bright if they can keep this bunch together. Had it not been for injuries in the playoffs to David Lee in the first game and Harrison Barnes in the first half off the last game, who knows where they may have gone. One thing is for certain, the fans in Oakland love this team. That arena was loud all night.