The Spurs just got a gift from the Western Conference they better not waste

With the craziness of the NBA trade deadline behind us, we can refocus on the season. I doubt the Spurs are going to add any players via the buyout market, so the players on the roster now will likely be the ones we watch when the postseason hits. Now is a good time to take stock of San Antonio's current blessings because there's reason to smile.

Spurs have been given some breathing room in the West

Nikola Jokic missed about a month's time, and that should have been the chance for the Silver and Black to create some space from the third overall seed. It didn't happen that way. The Spurs were up and down in January, and the Nuggets were resilient. Now the Joker is back, but once again, we're getting opposite results from what we expected.

Denver is on a three-game losing streak after falling to the New York Knicks in a double-overtime thriller last night. That came on the heels of a loss to OKC and the Pistons. Spurs Nation couldn't have asked for a better outcome in that hellacious stretch for them. Their upcoming schedule is much lighter, so it was imperative that they drop those games.

San Antonio is two games ahead of the Nuggets, 2.5 ahead of the Rockets, and 3 ahead of the Timberwolves. Their next two games are against the lowly Dallas Mavericks, followed by meetings with the Lakers and Warriors. The Spurs, then, hit All-Star Weekend fresh off their Golden State matchup, and that puts them in a favorable position heading down the home stretch of the season.

San Antonio can catch their second wind during the break

The guys will be heading into the annual Rodeo Road Trip soon, but the week off will be more important than anything else. They played with a ton of intensity to start the season, and their focus tapered off a little in January. As Mitch Johnson suggested, that's probably a product of a long season.

Guys tend to slow down when they hit the middle, and that was reflected in numbers across the league. Some time off should do them well. They'll, of course, have to finish the road trip in the immediate aftermath, but they're more prepared for it this year than they were last season when they were integrating De'Aaron Fox and dealing with the loss of Victor Wembanyama (DVT).

It's a different season, and things have been looking up from the very first game when Wemby dominated the Mavericks on national television, embarrassing the now-traded Anthony Davis and the rest of that Dallas front line that was supposed to be formidable. We're at a point where you can't call the Spurs fraudulent and have people take you seriously. This is a really good young team.

Their goal now should be to continue proving that, and the best way to do it would be to come out of the February break playing like their hair is on fire. It worked to start the year, and it will work to end it.

Do that. If they take advantage of all the missteps the other teams in the West have taken, they can finish the season with the second seed. It'll rubber-stamp one of the most magical regular seasons the Spurs have had in a very long time.