Written by Dan Devine at YahooSports.com
For 12 minutes, Monday’s contest seemed like a natural extension of the weekend for the San Antonio Spurs and Charlotte Hornets. Coming off their impressive Saturday night strangulationof the Golden State Warriors, Gregg Popovich’s crew held Charlotte to just seven first-quarter points (San Antonio’s stingiest frame of the season) on 3-for-22 shooting, with Kemba Walker struggling while his counterparty Tony Parker soared. And following their Saturday night defeat at the hands of the lottery-boundDenver Nuggets, the Hornets seemed several steps slow, carved up and trapped and in danger of falling off the pace in the race for home-court advantage in the first round of the playoffs.
And then, the Hornets’ defense started to lock in, the offensive floodgates opened, and Jeremy Lin — finally — found his flow.
After shooting just 30.6 percent from the floor through the first 10 games of March, Lin went 6-for-10 from the field in the Denver loss, and evidently, that was enough to prime the pump for the kind of offensive explosion that made him a household name four years ago and that he’s so often found himself chasing ever since. The 27-year-old reserve guard scored 12 points in the second quarter to help kickstart the Charlotte offense and begin the process of chopping down San Antonio’s 23-point lead.
He’d come up with an even better encore, pouring in 15 points in the final frame to complete the comeback and lead the Hornets to an improbable 91-88 win that dealt San Antonio a rare and historic loss:
Walker has carried the Hornets offense since the All-Star break, but was unable to get untracked on Monday, finishing with just six points on 2-for-11 shooting. Steve Clifford needed to look elsewhere for offense, and he found it in Lin, who had all facets of his scoring game going.
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