Spurs Get Burned by Suns’ Hot Day

Still no sign of old what’s-his-name, and if you want to see the defending NBA champions again, you’d better look fast.

Once again without Tim Duncan, the San Antonio Spurs were still good enough to take a 10-point lead into Saturday’s fourth quarter but picked a bad time to unravel. Reserve Todd Day scored 16 points in the quarter--one more than the entire Spur team--and the Phoenix Suns won, 101-94, to take a 2-1 lead in the first-round playoff series.

Phoenix can make it an official dethroning by winning Game 4 Tuesday, and no one knows if Duncan, who has sat out the series because of a knee injury, will play.

“Mentally, we just broke down,” veteran guard Terry Porter said of the Spurs. “I don’t know what our mind-set was, but it makes our season very simple. We’ve got to play a game like it’s the last one and try to get to Game 5.”

The Suns have had their own problems with Tom Gugliotta sidelined for the duration and Jason Kidd hoping to make it back--if they advance to the next round.

Thus, it shouldn’t be a total surprise that someone unexpected had to step up to win this one for them.

Someone who wasn’t even in the league last season.

Someone who tried to get a job in Europe this season but couldn’t.

That was Day, who didn’t take a shot or score a point in the first three quarters, who was playing, said Coach Scott Skiles, “to space the floor”--to make the Spurs keep a defender on him, opening up things for his teammates.

It was OK for Day to shoot if open, and he started getting open as the small, desperate Suns hurled themselves all over the bigger Spurs, getting eight offensive rebounds in the quarter. Day made three three-point shots, the last with 1:19 remaining to break a 94-94 tie, putting the Suns ahead to stay.

At the other end, David Robinson, en route to a 37-point game, made a move into the middle but pitched it to Antonio Daniels, spotting up on the three-point line.

A Sun flew at Daniels, forcing him to fake and move in for a 17-footer. This one, he shot off the side of the backboard. For the defending champs, it’s just the way the season has gone.

This had been a woeful series before Saturday, with five of the 10 starters making less than 33% of their shots--David Robinson 32.4%, Cliff Robinson 25.7%, Luc Longley 20%, Randy Livingston 16.7%, Mario Elie 11.1%. But this game actually looked like basketball in a lot of places.

It looked like the Spurs would win too. The Suns had gotten away with playing in front of Robinson but Saturday, his teammates began lobbing over the top and Robinson began tearing up the shorter Suns inside.

He scored 33 points in the first three quarters and the Spurs led, 79-69. But with Robinson on the bench, their first six possessions in the fourth quarter went like this: Porter layup blocked, turnover by Daniels, turnover by Porter, field goal by Samaki Walker, three-point miss by Jaren Jackson, 20-foot airball by Jackson.

Back came the Suns. When they missed, they went to the boards.

With 1:56 to play, Penny Hardaway, who went 47 minutes and compiled a triple-double (17 points, 13 assists, 12 rebounds), made a reverse layup through Robinson and the Suns led, 94-91.

With 1:37 left, Elie hit a game-tying three-point shot--his third field goal of the series.

With 1:19 to play, Day made a three-point shot to put the Suns ahead to stay, dropping the hammer on the Spurs for good.

Day, out of the league last season, got a tryout with the Suns on the recommendation of his childhood friend from Memphis, Hardaway, so that’s another contribution Hardaway made toward Saturday’s victory.

“He was just at home,” Hardaway said. “He was trying to go overseas, but that didn’t work out. He had played a year in the CBA and hated that. I mean, when you’ve tasted the NBA, you know how lucky you are to be here.”

Said Day: “I’ve always been this guy who’s been in trouble--but I’ve never been in trouble. I’ve been labeled. I’ve never been in trouble with the law, organizations, other players, anything like that. It was just something, I got a label stuck on me and once you get a label in this league, you’re dead.”

He used to be known for being rebellious. Once, Miami Heat Coach Pat Riley informed him he was cutting him in front of the other players.

Saturday was Day’s day. One more and the Spurs will be the ones who are dead.