San Antonio @ ATLANTA, END RESULTS: SPURS survives late rally from Hawks in Fox’s debut, 126-125

Looking out to get their first win on Rodeo -Rroad Trip, San Antonio Spurs entered the home of Atlanta Hawk, which not only was looking for a big evening in De’Aaron Fox’s debut as a spur, but also knows they have hawks -Draft choice of choice of choice. After a big first half that saw the spurs get up with as much as 20, a Turd quartal where they gave up 43 points, let Hawks back in the game. Trae Young got hot in the fourth, and the Hawks were able to tie the game with 8 seconds back, but the spurs made just enough acting at the right time, including Victor Wembanyama’s decision to purposefully miss his second free throw with 2.9 Seconds back to the cover of the timeout-less hawks a good last look and they held on with a 126-125 win.

Fox had a fantastic debut with 24 points, 13 assists, 5 rebounds and 3 steals, and Wemby and Vassell contributed 24 points per night. Young led Hawks with 32 points, mostly in the second half, and Onyeka Okongwu had a big evening with 30 points on 13-16 shooting.

Observations

• Fox’s first moments that Spur went as well as could be expected. In 8 minutes he had 3 assists and six points on two pullup triangles in the transition: Something the spurs haven’t had in a while. Not surprisingly, the biggest new threat he brings to Spurs is speed. He can run with players in Halfcourt and push it into transition, which helps either prevent the violation from chasing or getting it unstopped, where otherwise spurs have trouble falling into too many ISO-ball scenarios.
• As predicted, Devin Vassell enjoyed greatly benefit from Fox’s presence, which drew more defensive attention away from him and opened more lanes to run or take open jumpers. He answered in front of his hometown audience with 20 points on 9-18 shooting despite having only hit 2-8 from three.
• Wemby Only 8 points on three shots (5 free throw) in the first half. Maybe he just let Fox have his moment, but generally he looked exhausted out of the night after dealing with a disease a few games ago. Still, he chose his spots to go on Spurts, including seven quick points to start the third quarter and a massive put-back dunk with 30 seconds left to resume the lead and the aforementioned free kick. You know that Wemby reaches the upper joint when he mostly looks terrible in a game and still has such an impact and puts his normal numbers.
• With Hawk’s lack of size, Jeremy Sochan himself had one night diving to the basket with 15 points on 7-8 shooting, with his only miss being a three. However…
• Before the game, it was announced that my favorite backup center goal, Jonas Valanciunis, had been acquired by Kings for … SIDY CISSOKO and two second round choices. My first reaction was disappointment because the spurs could have made exactly the same offer, though Jesus Gomez spoke a little from the ledge, explaining that Spurs would actually have been necessary to include more than cissoko for wage purposes as they had only about $ 3 million in Cap space. Either way, the point is still that the spurs need to add depth in the middle of the position of Zach Collins away and Bassey out with a sprained MCL. The little ball worked tonight as Hawks have similar injury problems with their front court, but it doesn’t work so well on many nights.