Hammon sees there's plenty of work to be done in Spurs restart

SAN ANTONIO — After four months away from basketball, the San Antonio Spurs returned to play in a scrimmage game against the Milwaukee Bucks in a fan-less arena in the NBA's "bubble."

It was the first of three scrimmage games ahead of the team's first regular-season match on July 31 and if anything came from the 113-92 thumping was that there's plenty of work still to be had.

"If you want to take a positive, there wasn't a lot, no body got hurt," quipped Becky Hammon serving as head coach. "We just didn't play well."

With it being the player's first time against competition (and from the long hiatus), sloppy play was expected. The Spurs turned the ball over 22 times (31 Bucks points) total and their defense slowly faded as the game went forward.

The Spurs held the Bucks to 28% shooting after the first period, 38% shooting at halftime (18% from the 3-point line), and held Milwaukee to 47 points at the break.

When the second half began, the Spurs could not duplicate what they did in the first half defensively and sputtered offensively.

"We didn't have any carry-over from what we've been doing in practice. The ball stopped moving and we just got real passive defensively," she said. "That's an issue. That's been an issue for us all year."

And she is right.

The Spurs' play versus the Bucks mirrored their defensive play before the stoppage. They rank 24th in the league in Defensive Rating (112.8) while giving up 114.9 points per game, placing them at 24th in the NBA in this category.

However, one must factor that the team was without LaMarcus Aldridge, Trey Lyles, and were playing with different lineups with young players getting more NBA minutes than they had before the pandemic. It can be expected there would be some errors.

Said Lonnie Walker: "We’re still finding our way, finding ourselves, seeing what we can and cannot do as a team. It’s all a work in progress.”

Fortunately, this is a meaningless game standing-wise but important for the team's young core to learn and grow from.

The team played Murray and Derrick White together and the team defense excelled. Walker and Keldon Johnson rebounded from a slow first half with them scoring 14 points and 11 points respectively, in the second half. Jakob Poeltl finished with eight points, seven rebounds (four offensive), and two blocks while the veteran DeMar DeRozan showed there no rust on the offensive end scoring a quick eight points and adding two steals, before sitting out after 20 minutes of play.

All positive signs even if Hammon feels the team isn't at a good spot right now.

"We just got real passive defensively and that's an issue. It's been an issue for us all year," said Hammon. "We want to get better defensively and we just got to stay on them and continue to demand excellence from them on that side of the ball."

Said Murray: "We could have been more aggressive. We could have done a lot of things better but at the end of the day, it was our first game."

San Antonio will get another chance to improve and continue the development of young players. They'll face Brooklyn Saturday afternoon in their second scrimmage game.

The young player will likely play a bulk of the minutes and work on the defensive side for the ultimate goal of prepping the next generation of San Antonio players.

"Obviously, there are growth opportunities but right now it’s about our guys. It’s about their growth, not mine essentially," Hammon said.

Twitter: @JeffGSpursZone