Deux de moins
Dog Days Are Over - There I was. At a hotel restaurant bar in Park City, Utah. Nearly surrounded by Minnesotans. Minnesotans to my left. Minnesotans hovering behind the couch I was sitting on. Thankfully no Minnesotans to my immediate right but definitely a few periodically wandering by on my right being sure to make me aware of their disruptive presence. What kind of Coen Brothers dark comedy situation have I managed to get myself into this time? Normally I find Minnesotans perfectly lovely. I enjoy the Twin Cities and their people every time I visit and considering that I have tremendous admiration for the way they taught our nation how to effectively fight back against fascist ice occupation, authoritarianism and oligarchy with their January 23rd “No Work, No School, No Shopping” general strike, I welcome their company in almost any situation. This, however, was the rare exception. This was not normal. This was Game One of the NBA Western Conference Semifinals between my San Antonio Spurs and their Timber Wolves.
The conference I was in Park City to attend was my labor union’s district meeting so it just so happened to also have a large delegation of attendees from The Land of 10,000 Lakes because of course it would when that is where the Spurs’ opponents for the playoff matchup taking place during my trip also reside. When a Minneapolis-based friend proposed that we watch Monday’s game together when we first saw each other at the conference on Saturday, I reluctantly agreed. As regular readers of this blog series know by now, I’m superstitious about the environment in which I watch Spurs playoff games. Since I can’t attend the games in person often (living in Denver), I prefer the quiet comfort of watching the game at home in a controlled environment to the social interaction of watching the game out in public but since that wasn’t an option for this particular game during this particular road trip, I didn’t want to be that antisocial lame-o who declines the rare opportunity to hang socially with some cool peeps (even if they happen to be Wolves fans) and watches the game alone in his hotel room.
We were able to reserve the couches and entire seating area in front of the biggest TV screen in our conference hotel’s restaurant and (other than the Peacock stream getting occasionally blurry or hung up) it proved to be an excellent social environment to watch the game in mixed company. (The “One Dollar Wings” special they were serving for the evening didn’t hurt either.) From the opening tip, the smack talk was bouncing back and forth from the opposing camps like a ping pong ball. Luckily, there were a few other Spurs fans in our party but we were significantly outnumbered by Wolves fans. Add on top of that that I am widely known throughout the my labor union’s district as the biggest San Antonio Spurs fan in the entire organization, most of the incoming fire was directed at me personally. That incoming fire wasn’t immediate, though. The Wolves fans didn’t have a lot to say while watching Victor Wembanyama block two shots in the first minute of the game and a third less than two and a half minutes in. It wasn’t until Minnesota pulled out the first real lead of the game going up 14-8 halfway through the first that the Minnesota cackles also started getting the upper hand in the chatter. It didn’t take long for the Spurs to bounce right back and for me to start asking my Wolves-supporting friends, “Can you remind me which is better: zero championship rings or five championship rings? I’m having a hard time remembering.” At the end of the first quarter, Minnesota had a one point lead but I was most definitely holding the slight edge in the smack talk.
My wings arrived at the beginning of the second quarter. Normally, I don’t like eating during any Spurs game much less during a Spurs playoff game (remember, I’m superstitious) but between arriving in Park City on Friday, going to the gym & attending a staff meeting & participating in a “Game Show Experience” team building event & dropping a May Day labor track playlist on Saturday, attending sessions & going to the gym & a banquet & DJing karaoke at the conference on Sunday, attending workshops, coordinating a campaign’s recognition fight, finishing Quatre de faits, and going to the gym on Monday, I hadn’t had time to eat at all that day and much at all since arriving in Utah so because of the fact I was starving plus I couldn’t resist the bargain of the restaurant’s “One Dollar Wings” special, I decided to throw caution to the wind by ordering food to eat during the game. If you weren’t already aware, let me be the first to inform you that it’s harder to maintain the upper hand in a verbal sparring match while constantly having a mouthful of food. On top of that, after Minnesota had extended their lead back up to a six point 29-23 advantage a little more than a minute into the frame, I was seriously second-guessing my decision to eat during the game and irrationally tying it to having a negative impact on the Spurs’ performance on the court. Luckily, the block party was reconvened at that point and persisted throughout second quarter (with Wemby recording four more along with Harrison Barnes and Devin Vassell each getting one) allowing us to claw our way back to a 45-45 tie at halftime of this tightly-contested defensive battle. Heading into the break, I was relieved that my meal ultimately hadn’t generated the negative impact I was superstitiously fearing it might but I also knew I was going to need to resume filling my mouth with witty barbs instead of tasty wings during the second half in order to reestablish my advantage over the Wolves fans in my viewing party in the smack talk department.
The trend of a tightly-contested defensive battle held in the third quarter. The natural “feeling each other” out quality that most series openers embody was devolving quickly into a straight up rock fight. Every time San Antonio inched ahead on the scoreboard throughout the period, Minnesota responded to draw back even or occasionally go slightly ahead themselves. Similarly, the back and forth between Wolves fans and Spurs fans in our group was intensifying from lighthearted banter to emotionally-charged reactions to the constant swings in momentum. The refereeing and which team was benefiting more from the calls being made inevitably started becoming a focal point for debate during the third quarter as it was becoming increasingly clear that this game was going down to the wire and every single good or bad, made or missed call could have a real impact on the outcome. From my perspective, Minnesota was getting away with being allowed to be ultra physical on defense while benefiting from ticky tack calls on offense resulting in them being gifted a parade to free throw line during the period. I was of course letting my Twin Cities’ friends know my opinion unequivocally as this was playing at and then roasting them when they weren’t taking advantage to the tune of seven missed free throws in the Third. “Y’all do realize you are allowed to put the ball through the basket when you get to shoot without anyone guarding you, right? That’s why they call it a free throw.” I was in pique form laying down the proverbial shit-talking gauntlet when Dylan Harper snagged a defensive rebound and then went coast-to-coast to score and put us up five with just over a minute left in the frame. Ultimately, I was pleased with the position we were in up three at 72-69 heading into the fourth. During the commercial break I was pretty careful to balance the duel goals of continuing to remind my Minnesota friends what’s what but without going so overboard that I risked inviting bad karma for my cause. I was cautiously optimistic that we were going to keep trending forward by jumping on them early in the fourth to extend the lead and in doing so, put both the game and the opposition’s “howling” to bed for good. Unfortunately, I would quickly realize that was just wishful thinking.
The jabbering in my left ear had been incessant all night but it hit a fever pitch when, after continuing to trade punches back and forth for the first six minutes of the fourth quarter, the Timberwolves went on an extended run to achieve the biggest lead of the night, a nine point advantage, when Julius Randle hit a 13-footer to put his side up 97-88 with 3:41 to play. The Minnesota delegation in that Park City, Utah hotel restaurant was brimming with overconfident barbs, most of which were directed at me personally. “Look, I think Ted is going to cry” or “You can see it in his face, he’s throwing in the towel and ready to concede defeat” or “Aren’t the Spurs the supposed to win at home? Are y’all trying to give up home court advantage?” In the moment, I was personally embracing their overconfidence and ridiculous accusations as 1) I was happy to allow them to be the ones to bring on the bad karma for their smack talk veering into overexuberance 2) I knew there was still an eternity left in the game. My intuition was accurate. As we all know by now, the San Antonio Spurs responded with a furious rally down the stretch to put ourselves in position (down two with six seconds left and the ball) to attempt a game-winning three pointer at the buzzer. As you might imagine, the Timberwolves fans got awfully quiet while this was unfolding and were noticeably sheepish while they were realizing they might in fact lose a game that they had prematurely already put in the win column in their own minds.
On a night where we were not sharp offensively (we were clearly rusty from five days off), and where Minnesota benefited from the officiating more than we did on balance (Stephon Castle, one of our three most important players, fouled out with 3:20 to play after falling victim to some questionably soft calls that the referees weren’t calling against the Wolves on the other end of the floor), and where Victor Wembayma (who receives the player of the game honors for setting an NBA playoff record for most blocks in a playoff game with 12 and coupling that with 15 rebounds) couldn’t get anything going on offense (5-17 from the field, only 1-2 from the line and a disastrous 0-8 from downtown), Julian Champagnie, our best three point shooter, had an opportunity to win the game at the buzzer. Given the circumstances, I was more than happy to be in that situation and have that opportunity. When the shot was in the air, I was convinced it was going in. Of course, it rimmed off and the Minnesota Timberwolves fans erupted in an explosion of celebration, bragging, and smack talking that attempted to mask their relief that they were lucky to escape and also one that I’m confident they will come to regret as the series progresses due to the aforementioned bringing of bad karma upon themselves. After it hit me that the game was over and we had lost, I just sat there on the couch staring at the TV processing what had happened and listening to outlandishly overconfident trash-talking over a victory that deep down, my friends from the North Star State know they were lucky to escape with.
Had Julian’s shot gone in, the narrative these past 48 hours would have been how the battle-tested back-to-back Western Conference finalists melted down in the final minutes of Game 1, blowing a nearly insurmountable lead down the stretch to the young, inexperienced team from South Texas. They know how close they were to that reality and they also know how, given the Grand Canyon level depths below our potential the Spurs played on Monday night, Game 1 was more of a must-win for them than it was for us. That win was crucial for them having any chance to win this series. (By the way, for the record, Timberwolves Head Coach Chris Finch can miss me with his sore-winner complaining about some of Victor’s blocked shots being goaltending as if we all didn’t see with our eyes that Minnesota benefited the most from the whistle on Monday.) For us, it was a learning experience that I fully expect us to bounce back from tonight with the fury of a ten thousand suns so that by the time we board a plane tomorrow, those ten thousand lakes up there are completely dried up by the drought that is Victor Wembanyama’s date with destiny and his continued journey towards inevitability. In the end, I’m glad I had the experience of watching Game 1 in mixed company. In all seriousness, I was able to enjoy watching the game with some really cool people and have a memorable experience even though it didn’t break my way in the end. The back and forth smack talk was all in good fun and there is a cool little invention called a cellular telephone through which we can keep the dialogue going over the next two weeks. The Minnesota Timberwolves and their fans haven’t won anything yet and getting the upper hand through opening statements has never once sealed a victory at trial. We have plenty of deliberating still to come. While I’m glad to have watched Game 1 socially, I’m also relieved that I’ll be watching Game 2 tonight in the comfortable controlled environment of on my couch in my living room at home (the Spurs are 4-0 this year in the playoffs when I watch the game at home and 0-2 when I watch it somewhere else). Here’s to getting back to basics tonight and getting back on track. When the verdict is handed down at some point in the next two weeks, I fully expect us to be the one’s making the closing statement and earning the ultimate right to talk that talk.
#GoSpursGo
Headline Image Source: Sportsnet
