Brendan Haywood

Yeah, Paul.

I want to go back to October.

Wemby was coming off last year with a blood clot and not a great second year.

Did anyone in your business, any pundits, analysts, have the spurs in the finals?

No, because there's a formula for success in the NBA.

And

That formula is get to the playoffs first, take your lumps, and then get to the finals and compete for a championship.

Sometimes, like in the case of Boston, you've got to get to the conference finals five or six times, and you've got to lose in the finals before you win a championship.

Sometimes, like Oklahoma City, where you get beat in the second round one year, win a championship the next year.

But...

with very little exceptions, there is the path to take.

You've got to take that path and lose in the conference playoffs.

The Spurs, what they've done is nearly unprecedented.

To not only get to the finals, but to beat back some of the teams they did.

A Minnesota team that was injured but had more experience.

A Oklahoma City team that was the defending champs, injured but had a lot of experience, down 3-2 to win a series like that.

You don't see stuff like that happen.

So, no, nobody believed that the Spurs team was capable of that.

So, I think they're going to come out with some energy in this game.

I think they're going to win game two because I think they know it's basically win or go home for the San Antonio Spurs.