Spurs Top Warriors in Double Overtime on Ginobili Game-Winner

The Warriors stayed hot after upsetting the Nuggets in round one of the NBA’s postseason, but the Spurs got even hotter when it mattered most, as the West’s number two seed rallied to win game one against Golden State in double overtime 129-127.

After trailing by 16 points with just four minutes to go in regulation, the Spurs went on an 18-2 run to send the game into overtime. After a five-minute tie, Spurs guard Manu Ginobili settled things by hitting a game-winning three-pointer with 1.2 seconds remaining in the second overtime.

“It’s only the second one I made all day,” Ginobili said, according to ESPN.com. “Good timing though.”

Golden State’s Jarrett Jack had an opportunity to answer, but missed a potential game-winner at the buzzer.

Despite the last second loss, Golden State proved it belonged with the mighty Spurs. Stephen Curry continued his hot streak, scoring 44 points on 18 of 35 shooting. His 22-point third-quarter outburst helped the Warriors build a 12-point advantage heading into the fourth quarter. Even Ginobili wasn’t sure how his team managed to comeback from such a deficit so late in the game.

“I have no clue. I really got to watch it to see what happened,” he said. “They started missing shots. Steph was unbelievable in the third quarter.”

Tony Parker led all San Antonio scorers with 28 points, while Danny Green added 22 and Tim Duncan put in 19 more. Kawhi Leonard scored 18 points, but provided a huge lift to the Spurs late on the defensive end by forcing Curry to miss shots down the stretch.

Game one was definitely the most entertaining game fans have gotten to enjoy so far this postseason, but it also showed that the Warriors may give the Spurs more trouble than we initially thought. Earlier in the week, I predicted the Spurs would advance past Golden State in five or six games. After watching Golden State control the game on San Antonio’s home floor for most of regulation, better make that at least six games. 

However, the loss did mark 30 straight that Golden State has dropped in San Antonio going back to 1997. With the way the Warriors are playing, that seems like a streak they should break, but after losing 30 in a row, maybe it’s more of a curse than a streak?

San Antonio was favored by nine points, which they obviously didn’t cover last night. Expect that number to go down a bit for game two, which takes place tomorrow in San Antonio.