Spurs Are Lacking Reasons to Believe

We’re live outside the San Antonio dressing room, where we can report the guys are definitely running out of reasons to be optimistic.

Like old soldiers, the Spurs just faded away Friday night. By the fourth quarter, they had ceased to exist as a fighting force, which was unfortunate because the Lakers spent the rest of the game dunking on their heads.

You don’t think the Spurs might have lost a little belief in this mission, do you?

“I think if you looked at this game tonight, it would go through your head,” a steely calm Coach Gregg Popovich said afterward. “I don’t know if it’s true or not, but it’s something that would go through your head.

“If you get beat that badly, assuming that you have talent on the floor, you either have a character problem or you have a belief problem.

“You know these guys well enough to know it’s not a character problem so I have to wonder if, way down deep in their guts, the belief has waned . . . and that [ticks] me off.”

Moments later, Popovich’s comments about waning belief were relayed to David Robinson, who actually laughed when he heard them.

Said Robinson: “Hard to argue against that right now.”

Actually, to be honest--and no one ever is until the series is over--the Spurs are way beyond doubt. They’re now certain they’re history.

Belief began ebbing in Game 1, when the Lakers toyed with them on their own floor, taking away their precious home-court advantage.

Playoff series are pressure-and-emotion-packed events, which are known to turn in a hurry. If Game 1 didn’t finish the Spurs off, Game 2 would.

That was even worse for the Spurs because they played well enough to run up a 14-point lead . . . then saw the Lakers take it away as if it were a tot’s ice cream cone.

For the record, the Spurs came up with reasons they could turn the series around, even on the Lakers’ floor.

Derek Anderson would be back.

David Robinson could turn it up on offense.

Reading between the lines, another reality loomed. The Spurs knew they might be in over their heads this time.

Nor was that a surprise in the Spur Nation. Before Game 2, the local Express-News ran a front-page story headlined, “Praying for a comeback.”

In it, a woman named Gwendolyn Rainge of the Refuge Church of Our Lord of the Apostolic Faith, said they hadn’t said an actual prayer for the Spurs, “but I’m sure there were a lot of silent prayers being said. We won’t start praying out loud until they lose two games.”

Heaven knows what one does trailing 3-0.

Not that Popovich was desperate, but Anderson, who, he had said, would only play in this series “if something miraculous happens,” went back into the starting lineup for Game 3--as a 6-foot-5, 195-pound forward--despite not having played in almost three weeks.

If the Spurs were going to converge on Shaquille O’Neal and then help each other out with Kobe Bryant, they’d have to do a lot of scrambling, so maybe small and athletic was the way to go.

Of course, Anderson was a reach as putative savior. In five playoff games before getting hurt, he had averaged 10 points, down from 15.5 during the season, and shot 31%.

It worked as well as anything else has for the Spurs this series, which is to say: Not even a little bit.

Anderson went 0 for 8 from the floor and scored two points.

Robinson stepped up, scoring 24 points.

Unfortunately, Tim Duncan stepped back, missing 11 of 14 shots and scoring nine.

O’Neal and Bryant scored 71 points--one fewer than the entire San Antonio team--and shot 60%. Good thing the Spurs were doing all that helping, you’d hate to see what Shaq and Kobe might have gone for against single coverage.

By now, it’s obvious to everyone, Spurs included, this is a mismatch, and the question is no longer “if” but “when.”

Afterward, Popovich eschewed the theatrical approach, staging no shows of anger or disbelief, promising no last stands in Game 4.

“You go play,” he said. “There’s no elixir anywhere and I don’t know any drills. You just come and play again. That’s our job.”

Long-range employment, it’s not, however. You can believe that.