When the largest crowd ever to watch a regular-season NBA game packs the dome, it won’t be just a fond remembrance of what the Spurs were two decades ago. It will be a celebration of everything they’ve become since, columnist Mike Finger writes.
Work crews begin the tedious work of laying out the Spurs basketball court at the Alamodome on Monday, Jan. 9, 2023. As part of the organization’s 50th anniversary, the Spurs will play the Golden State Warriors at the Alamodome to a potentially record-breaking audience. The Spurs are looking to have nearly 65,000 fans pack the dome on Friday.The last nine times the Spurs attempted shots inside the Alamodome, they missed.
The last image of the Spurs’ previous building, HemisFair Arena, was one of Charles Barkley cruelly closing the metaphorical doors.An authority none other than Gregg Popovich agreed with that assessment. One year after wondering aloud if his players lost belief “deep in their guts” while getting dominated by the Lakers, he lamented his team’s lack of composure in the Alamodome finale.
Would they ever again party like it was 1999? Would the new tin barn on the rodeo grounds ever feel as joyous and as alive as that cavernous dome on Montana Street did? Or would the disappointment Bryant diagnosed follow the Spurs across town, forever?That’s why when the largest crowd ever to watch a regular-season NBA game packs the dome Friday night, it won’t be just a fond remembrance of what the Spurs were two decades ago.
Eventually the expectations changed, and the dread mostly went away. There were still moments of heartbreak — Derek Fisher at 0.4, Dirk Nowitzki with the and-one, Ray Allen from the corner — but they were the exceptions, not the norm.The norm became watching other upstarts and other underdogs not be able to handle the moment.
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