The San Antonio Spurs beat the Philadelphia 76ers on Saturday night 114-105. Devon Vassell led the Spurs with 22 points. Keldon Johnson added 21. Four other Spurs were in double-figures, with Tre Jones scoring 17, Doug McDermott 14, Jakob Poeltl 13 and Josh Richardson 11. The Spurs are now 2-1 on the season and play the Minnesota Timberwolves on Monday night.
Postgame Comments:
SAN ANTONIO SPURS HEAD COACH GREGG POPOVICH
On the Spurs competitiveness in the game…
“I thought we worked real hard. Obviously, with the quick turnaround back-to-back is not what any of us love, but we all have them. But, it showed me that we’re serious about getting better and understanding what the league is like. And for the young guys, I thought that was pretty impressive to play as hard as they did.”
On Jakob Poeltl’s play in the game tonight…
“Jakob [Poeltl]… he’s, we all know, he’s not going to have the talent as some of the guys he plays against. But, nobody plays harder. Nobody plays smarter. He’s just a constant pro the way that he does.”
On Doug McDermott’s play off the bench tonight…
“He [Doug McDermott] was basically our offense, especially down the stretch. If he didn’t make those shots, we would’ve been in trouble because they had cranked up their defense. Did a good job. They were attacking us at the other end and scoring. But, if he wasn’t doing that, we wouldn’t have won the game.”
DOUG MCDERMOTT
On playing in Philadelphia at Wells Fargo:
“It’s a good building. We had some fun at Creighton here in college. I always like the fans here—the Philly fans, they always get you going. It’s a really good sports atmosphere.”
On playing against Harden and Maxey:
“They’re so talented. Maxey is super quick, it’s hard to contain him. You almost have to run him
off the line and make him finish over Jakob, which is kind of what we did. James, he’s a great
scorer but he’s also getting everyone involved. It’s a tough duo and they’re going to be really
good this year, obviously. I think they’ll go really far.”
On Joel’s 40 points and Jakob Poeltl’s effort:
“Jakob is just a hell of a defender. He’s strong and has got really good timing. He’s good playing
without fouling which is huge against Embiid. I’ve played with some guys who get in foul
trouble early and it just messes up the whole rhythm. Jakob did a good job. I know he had 40 but he’s going to be an MVP.”
DEVIN VASSELL
About sticking through and being competitive:
“It was definitely a challenge today. We knew they were going to be aggressive, and we knew we were going to have to take that first punch. And we knew we weren’t going to deliver that first punch.”
On leaving Philly with a win on the road:
“It gives a lot of confidence for us. We’re a young group so at the end of the day it’s going to help us out. We’ll celebrate this win but right now at the end of the day we have 79 more games.”
Keeping Harden and Maxey out the paint:
“At the end of the day, we were all just aware on defense. We made sure we didn’t let them go into the paint. They’re both great players. We had to make sure we could get them out the paint.”
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PHILADELPHIA 76ERS HEAD COACH DOC RIVERS
On Team Miscues
“On both ends like I said almost before the game. Defensively we were slow, we were behind. Offensively we just cannot get pace… Our pace is bad, and we are always up against the clock offensively which we shouldn’t be with what we have and defensively, I said it in the Boston game, even when we make a run we couldn’t get a stop… We have a lot of work to do.”
On Moral victory with Embiid 40 piece
“I guess… you know, we lost the game. It’s good to see him. I just think that we need to play with more force as a team.”
On 3 pointers
“I want to see more 3 pointers. I want to see more open court. I want to see more guys getting to the paint. And that’s why you don’t get 3 pointers right now. We’re not pushing the ball up the floor. We’re not getting enough stops in a row to do anything like that. So yeah definitely more 3 pointers.”
JOEL EMBIID
On whether or not the time off from plantar fasciitis has impacted his rhythm to start the season…
“Yeah, obviously. I’m not playing at my best. We’re not winning. Tonight was a start. But, we’ve got to find ways to win. So, I need to play better.”
On how he feels after his plantar fasciitis injury…
“I’m still trying to work my way back, but coming into training camp, I hadn’t done anything in two months. So, it really slowed me down. But, I’m still trying to work my way back and hopefully everything goes back to normal.”
On being able to see your son watch you play?
“It’s great. I wish we had gotten the win for him. I think it’s his 7th game. It’s great having him.”
On biggest errors
“Defense. We just got to get better connected. We are not guarding the ball well and that’s on all of us… Like I said this is a fairly new team. it’s going to take time to get everybody on the same page.”
TOBIAS HARRIS
On team issues
“Today, lack of defensive effort. We do have to give them credit. They made tough shots but on our part that’s not the standard of defense that we hold ourselves to. 2nd quarter 35 points for them, 3rd quarter 31, you know our standard is 25 or less. With that, that’s not how we know we can defend and that’s the main thing of it. Then on the other side we did not do a good job of putting the ball in the basket as well. That’s what it really comes down to.”
On Late 3rd and 4th quarter
“On our part, lack of communication or lack of physicality. Especially in the 2nd half,3rd quarter but, in the 4th, when we really needed to get stops we didn’t have any physicality, we didn’t have any communication, we looked a little bit disorganized on the defensive end.
On Teammates
“It’s 3 games. They’ve been disappointing losses for us but this is a marathon. It’s hard at the moment and everybody’s going to overanalyze every little thing and we should because we expect that out of ourselves and we hold ourselves to that standard to who we believe we are as a team… We got to figure out ways that we can be better out there and ways that we can take over a game.”