<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>Take your pick. Tex Winter has. Just about every element of Game 1 of the NBA Western Conference finals qualifies as unbelievable, bizarre, strange, whatever you want to call it. What was weirder? Kobe Bryant in the first half? Or Kobe in the second? “Hard to figure out, isn’t he?” Winter said Thursday afternoon, still bemused many hours after the game. Bryant, though, has long been a mystery. There was much more to the game than his wildly divergent play. How about one of the best defensive teams of all time giving up a 20-point lead in the third quarter? Or the young Lakers themselves producing a miraculous surge with their best defensive play of the year? “We clamped down on ‘em,” said Winter, the longtime mentor to Lakers coach Phil Jackson. “They’ve shown signs here and there over the season that they were capable of big things defensively. But that was as good of an effort as I’ve seen. “I’m amazed we were able to do that.” All the more amazing, the San Antonio Spurs controlled the tempo throughout the game, and the Lakers were still able to pull off the defensive feat. “We can’t count on that happening again,” Winter added. In fact, if you count on anything from the Spurs, count on a poised, veteran team that knows how to execute over the course of a seven-game series. “I like the way they play,” Winter said admirably. “They space the floor, they move the ball, they find the open shot. They’re very poised.” Yes, winning Game 1 was nice, but the challenge remains very high for the Lakers. “We’re gonna have to play better offensively,” Winter said. “Our execution has got to improve.” To that end, the Lakers worked through reminders about offensive execution Thursday while going easy on the key players in the rotation. It would be nice if the team could get the sizzling kind of execution and passing it displayed in the first round against Denver. In the second round, the Utah Jazz were determined to bait the Lakers and shove them out of that execution. That strategy worked until Game 6 of that series in Utah when the Lakers were finally able to regain the sharp execution they needed on the “automatics” in their triangle offense. The “automatics” are the reads the players can make to bring the post high and make the defense pay for overplaying and too much aggressiveness. That’s when the back door opens up for the Lakers wings. Not surprisingly, these reads work best when Bryant moves from guard to the wing, his favorite spot from which to attack. The coaches don’t really have to move Bryant there. “He gravitates there more and more on his own,” Winter said. Opposing teams have watched Bryant attack from that spot for years, and there’s often little they can do about it. In the past opponents would come at Bryant in bunches, but he passes too well — the entire team moves the ball too well — for that to happen these days. Bryant can attack himself or he can make the defense pay if they try to double him. That was why Utah had so little success doubling Bryant in the second round. As Utah coach Jerry Sloan bemoaned, doubling Bryant just wasn’t possible. “He passes too well,” Sloan conceded. “Especially if he executes,” Winter said. The 86-year-old Lakers consultant isn’t sure what Bryant was doing in the first half of Game 1 against the Spurs, when he scored just two points and took just three shots. “He was just getting the ball to other guys, I guess,” Winter said. It’s not something the triangle guru wants to see again. “Kobe, he’s got to play a complete game throughout the game. He can’t just all of a sudden start inventing stuff.” When it mattered in the second half of Game 1, Bryant executed brilliantly. For all of Winter’s concerns, he knows the Spurs have a bigger one. They have to figure out what to do with Bryant when he gravitates to the danger zone.</div> Source: Lazenby Blog
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