NBA analysts point out potential fatal flaw Spurs must address quickly

Game one for the Spurs was a tale of two halves. The Silver and Black led at halftime 49-47, despite turning the ball over 12 times for several reasons. They lost the game, and though there are no moral victories in professional sports, you can still grow from the experiences, and there’s a lot to build on and a few things to clean up.

San Antonio turned the ball over 12 times to Dallas’ five in the first half; they gave up 10 offensive rebounds, and the Mavericks shot more free throw attempts. When you factor in Wembanyama’s 2/8 shooting and four turnovers, it’s a shock they were leading at the break.

They led because they played defense, holding one of the top offenses last season to less than 30% from three and 36% from the field while shooting 37% from deep and 45% overall on their end. But there was something off about the offense, and as the third quarter got started, it got worse as the Mavericks’ offense turned it up a few notches and broke the game open.

On a new NBA podcast, Half Court Hoops, Kevin O’Connor, and Gibson Pyper broke down some of the main reasons for San Antonio’s trouble with consistent offense.

Figuring out a counter to the switch has to be a top priority

Switching the pick-and-roll action is exactly the right move to make if you’re the defense, but the Spurs can’t allow the answer to their new supposed dynamic duo to be that simple. The problem is that, though you expect Chris Paul to have better shooting nights, he simply won’t be able to make teams pay for switches often enough for that to be sustainable.

Much of the onus will fall on Wembanyama to figure out ways to make the defense pay for switching on him. It’s hard for him to do that right now because pick-and-rolls generally start from so far from the basket that teams still have a chance to cut him off and use their strength to keep him away from the paint.

He’ll need to make his moves quicker and use his first step and handle to get his shot off in rhythm. That will require quicker decision-making—something he struggled with against the Mavericks.

You don’t want to take CP3 off the ball completely because you brought him here to run the offense. You don’t get the Chris Paul magic if he doesn’t have the rock. Turning him into a perennial spot-up shooter would be an admission that a miscalculation was made when they brought him in.

If anyone can figure it out, the combined brainpower of the Point God and Coach Popovich can. Since Wemby missed so much of the preseason, they've had little time to see how teams might defend them and adjust.

But it's clear that this is one route several defenses may take to slow down the CP3/Wemby 1-2 punch, so a counter will need to be inserted ASAP. The Western Conference is just too deep to fall behind due to such a simple defensive adjustment.