Aldridge leads Spurs past Suns
SAN ANTONIO -- LaMarcus Aldridge poured in 27 points and Tony Parker tied a season-high 20 as the San Antonio Spurs defeated the Phoenix Suns 119-98 on Wednesday at the AT&T Center, winning for the third straight game and eighth time in their past 10 outings.
Aldridge has been hotter than hot his last two games. On Wednesday, he hit 10 of his 12 shots from the floor, following up a 15-for-20 shooting, 33-point performance on Sunday in a win against Chicago.
The Spurs (26-6) won despite the absence of leading scorer and two-time defending NBA Defender of the Year Kawhi Leonard, who was scratched due to illness just before the game. It was the first game Leonard missed this season.
Pau Gasol added 16 points and 10 rebounds for San Antonio and Manu Ginobili and David Lee scored 12 points apiece of the bench and Danny Green hit for 11 points.
The Suns (9-23) were led by reserve guard TJ Warren's 23 points. Phoenix also got 14 points from Brandon Knight, 13 each from Eric Bledsoe and Marquese Chriss and 10 from Dragan Bender. The Suns' bench players outscored the starters 58-40.
Phoenix shot 68.8 percent from the floor in the first half but still trailed the Spurs 30-27 at the end of the first quarter. The Suns made all three of their 3-point shots -- San Antonio was 0 for 2 from beyond the arc -- but their nine turnovers led to 13 points for the Spurs. Phoenix's final turnover of the quarter came on a steal by Ginobili that led to a putback layup by Jonathan Simmons that just beat the horn to end the period.
The Suns forged a 9-2 run in the middle of the second quarter to take a 49-42 lead, with the majority of the damage done by their second unit as Bender had five points and Warren had two baskets in the surge. The Phoenix advantage grew to 10 points, at 62-52, at the 1:39 mark on an alley-oop dunk by Chriss off a running assist by Devin Booker and the Suns settled for a 64-58 lead at intermission.
Warren led Phoenix with 12 points off the bench in the first half while Bledsoe and Knight had 11 and 10 points, respectively. Aldridge paced the Spurs with 17 points and Parker and Gasol poured in 12 points each in the first 24 minutes for San Antonio.
The Suns outshot San Antonio 67.6-53.5 percent in the half, outrebounded the Spurs 17-16 and had 13 assists to San Antonio's nine.
A 9-4 run to open the third period, capped by a second-chance 3-pointer by Danny Green, allowed the Spurs to regain the lead at 67-66 at the 8:35 mark. Ginobili's grit on defense and opportunistic play on offense keyed a wild back-and-forth, end-to-end surge late in the period that allowed San Antonio an 85-76 advantage but had Popovich pounding the scorer's table to get the Spurs to slow things down and be more structured.
But Phoenix is used to freelancing and gambling on both ends of the floor and remained unfazed by the Spurs' short-lived change of character, cutting the San Antonio lead to 89-82 at the end of the third quarter.
NOTES: San Antonio F Kawhi Leonard (gastroenteritis) was ruled out for the game about 2 1/2 hours prior to tipoff. It was the first game Leonard missed this season. ... The Spurs now have a nine-game winning streak over Phoenix dating back to Halloween 2014. San Antonio beat the Suns 107-92 in Phoenix on Dec. 15, as five Spurs players scored in double figures. ... The teams will play for the third time this season on Jan. 14 in Mexico City. ... On Wednesday, the Suns began the sixth of 14 back-to-back sets this season, having gone going 1-4 in the first game and 1-4 in the second game in the first five. ... The Suns defeated San Antonio 137-91 in Phoenix on April 15, 1989. The 46-point loss remains the worst in Spurs franchise history.