Many believe that the San Antonio Spurs of today is no longer the once-feared Spurs side that could challenge for a title year in and year out. According to top NBA statistician Justin Kubatko, this perceived downfall might have a lot to do with their defense.
Kubatko presents a very interesting statistic that proves that the Spurs are no longer the defensive juggernaut they once were a few years back.
The Spurs have allowed 120 or more points 21 times over the last two seasons. From 1997-98 through 2016-17 – a span of 20 seasons – they allowed 120 or more points just 21 times.
— Justin Kubatko (@jkubatko) January 30, 2019
That's quite a convincing piece of information there. The Spurs have given up at least 120 points to their opponents just as many times in the past two years as they have in the two full decades preceding the last two seasons. This definitely speaks volumes on the level of defense the team have been playing over the past two years.
This season has been even more problematic for head coach Gregg Popovich and his team in terms of their defensive woes. There was a span, between November 28 and December 4 of last year, wherein the Spurs lost three out of four games. That's not a terribly awful string of losses, but it becomes much more embarrassing when you factor in the manner by which they took their defeats.
In those three losses, the Spurs gave up an average of 134.3 points to their opponents. Even worse, they lost by an average margin of 34.6 points. I will need to confirm this with Kubatko, but I'm willing to bet that this is one of, if not the worst run of blowout losses the Spurs have gone through over the past 20 years.
San Antonio currently hold a 30-22 record and are sitting at the sixth spot in a brutal Western Conference. They're still absolutely a Playoff team, but there is no doubt that they have lost a bit of their fear factor in the past couple of years.
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