Spurs make Raptors extinct, sweep season series

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The San Antonio Spurs (22-8) held off the Toronto Raptors (9-20) tonight winning 100-80 at the AT&T Center. With the win, the Spurs ended Toronto's 5-game winning streak and snapped their 7-game streak of holding opponents under 100 points.

The Spurs were paced by Tim Duncan's 15 points, 6 rebounds, and 2 block shots. The Raptors were led by Amir Johnson's 12 points, 6 rebound effort. 

For a first-half recap of tonight's Spurs-Raptors game, click here but here is the second-half recap.

Third Quarter:

Stat Leader: Duncan with 15 points, and 6 rebounds.

Recap: The Spurs and Raptors continued to have a back-and-forth game with the Spurs holding onto a slim lead. However, with a basket by Amir Johnson, Toronto cut San Antonio's lead down to four (57-53) with four minutes left in the quarter. But once again the Spurs leaned on their defense, led by Kawhi Leonard, to open a 10 point pead on Toronto late in the quarter. The Spurs finally kept the Raptors off the boards closing the gap to 30 a piece.

Score: Spurs 70, Raptors 57.

Fourth Quarter:

Stat Leader: 

Recap: Easy does it on both ends of the court was the name of the game in this quarter. The Spurs held the Raptors to "1-and-done" possessions which led the Spurs to a 15-point lead at one point during the quarter. But the Raptors just kept staying in the game and not giving the Spurs a big enough lead to pull the starters. Keeping the Spurs' lead over Toronto was free throws finishing at 82.8% (24-29) from the free throw line

Final Score: Spurs 100, Raptors 80.

Notes:

Tiago Splitter finished 8-11 from the free throw line.

Spurs biggest lead was 22 points.

Spurs outrebounded Toronto 44-35.

Spurs shot 82.8% from the free throw line.

Quotes:

Spurs' Popovich:

"But, I thought our defense was very good in the second half."  "We got back into our usual flow and it worked out well."

"Danny (Green) and Kawhi (Leonard) worked really hard chasing him while he was out there." (On Spurs' defense on DeMar DeRozan)

"I didn't think our perimeter rebounded much in the first half." (On Spurs' lack of rebounding in the first half)

"He's always been that way since he's been here. We didn't teach him that." (On Kawhi Leonard's passing lane defense)

Spurs' Duncan:

"It just took us a little while to get going. We;re going to have times like that, have nights like that." (On shaking off the rust from the Christmas break)

"There were a lot of clips at halftime that Pop showed us. Although we were doing a pretty decent defensively, we upped our pace offensively and got a few more stops and opened it up. (On second half defense)

"Kawhi is creating a lot of turnovers himself. He's getting a lot of steals and turning that into offense." (On Leonard's defense)

Spurs' Manu Ginobili:

"In the second half, we did step up and start to run a little bit more and score better so we got the lead. (On second half defense vs. Raptors)