We’ve looked at the regular season series and have also explored some of the key themes to look for on offense and defense. However, while history, talent, and execution all play a vital role in who wins a playoff series they are also decided by other variables. Sometimes, it’s the non-star player who can make his mark (think Trevor Ariza in the Lakers run to the 2009 championship) or a strategy shift (like Rick Carlisle inserting J.J. Barrea into the starting lineup in the 2011 Finals) or some other key match up that turns the tide.

With that in mind, here are a few X-factors that may come into play and make the ultimate difference in this series…

Mike D’Antoni
Coming in, there’s no doubt in anyone’s mind who the superior coach is. Greg Popovich has tasted championship glory four times and always seems to have his team well prepared and ready to compete at the highest level. There’s literally no bad words to say about the man and I won’t attempt to try and discredit him in any way. If he wins the coaching battle, it won’t be a surprise. In fact, it’s expected.

That said, Mike D’Antoni, even with all the hits he’s taken this year, is no slouch with the whiteboard and in diagramming a workable plan. D’Antoni is also no stranger to facing the Spurs in the post-season, with epic battles in his past that shaped the narrative of his career. D’Antoni will need to call on some of that experience against his old foe on the opposing sideline to try and create some advantages for his team over the course of the series.

Maybe that means deploying a seldom used lineup or going deeper into his bench. Their are already whispers that Steve Blake will join Steve Nash in the starting lineup (should Nash be available). The Blake/Nash backcourt duo hasn’t been the best defensive pairing this season but if Blake can hold his own against Tony Parker (a big if), Nash can slide over to defend Danny Green (who’s mostly just a spot up player) and it not be a huge risk. That approach may not end up working out (if it’s even explored at all), but it’s these types of moves that can make a difference and D’Antoni will need to come up with more of them to guide his team to victory in this series.

Antawn Jamison
Jamison has been the Lakers most consistent bench player all season. So, it wouldn’t necessarily surprise if he had a solid series whether the Lakers are able to upset the Spurs or not. That said, Jamison offers a unique versatility offensively that can be a major weapon against this version of the Spurs. Remember, Boris Diaw is unlikely to play in this series. That leaves the Spurs — who also waived Stephen Jackson — surprisingly thin in the front court behind Tim Duncan and Tiago Splitter, especially in regards to players who actually match up with Jamison well.

When Jamison comes in at PF, he’ll likely either be matched up with Matt Bonner or DeJuan Blair. Both aren’t used to defending on the perimeter or a player who offers the inside-outside game of Jamison. Jamison can be especially effective as a pick and roll/pick and pop player if defended by either of these players and if he can effectively knock down his jumper it only makes him more dangerous when slashing or attacking off the dribble against a closing out defender. And, if the Spurs decide to defend Jamison with a smaller player, he can try to work the offensive glass or get into the post on weak side duck-ins. Obviously depending too much on Jamison to be a difference maker can be problematic. And if he’s asked to carry the team in any given game the Lakers are in trouble. But as a change of pace player who comes in for Pau, he may be able to exploit the Spurs’ reserve big men.

Manu Ginobili
It’s funny to describe a mainstay of the Spurs’ success and a key performer who has real name recognition as an X-factor, but it’s true. Ginobili hasn’t had the best season — 11.4 points per game in a little over 23 minutes a night — and is coming off a hamstring injury that kept him out of the lineup for 9 of the Spurs final 10 games (he played 12 minutes and scored 2 points in the season finale).

Is Ginobili fully healthy? Is he ready to be the heavy minute contributor that the Spurs will need to make a big run in these playoffs? I’m sure the sense is that the Spurs have enough talent on the wing to beat the Lakers even if Manu isn’t 100%. And that’s likely true. But if Parker struggles (remember he’s had his own injury issues of late as well), the Spurs are suddenly lacking in another off the dribble creator that can hurt the defense in a variety of ways. Typically that player is Ginobili. If he’s ready to go, he can be the hammer off the bench that the Lakers don’t have an answer for. But if he’s limited, the Spurs may struggle to create the dribble penetration that their offense thrives off of.

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There are several other keys that I think will be important: will Meeks hit his open shots? If Nash returns, will D’Antoni still play Morris as a defensive substitute against Parker? Can Earl Clark play with enough energy and activity (while hitting some of his shots) to make a difference? The answers to these questions — especially if they go in the Lakers’ favor — could all impact the series positively for the Lakers. Of course, if any of the Spurs’ shooters are hitting shots or Blair is getting after the offensive glass or Splitter has a strong defensive game against Dwight and/or Pau, the Spurs can easily find themselves in the driver’s seat.

That’s the beauty of these things, you never know who will step up, you just know someone will and it will make a big difference.

While it can be informative to look at the regular season series between the Lakers and the Spurs, the fact is that both teams are different than the versions that played in those games. Injuries and other personnel decisions have affected roster composition. Further, the playoffs typically offer tweaks to offensive and defensive sets in an attempt to account for strengths and weaknesses of a specific opponent who won’t be changed until they’re dispatched (or hailed as victors).

Said another way, what we saw in the regular season matters but we should also expect some changes based of who’s available to play and what those players can and can’t do well on the floor. With that in mind, let’s look at this series on both sides of the ball to try and sort out what the Lakers need to do to remain competitive…

When the Lakers have the ball

First and foremost, wether or not Steve Nash plays in this series is a very important variable in how successful the Lakers’ offense can be. With Nash in the fold — assuming his healthy enough to replicate how he played for most of this regular season — the Lakers are much more dangerous on that side of the ball. Nash not only offers expert level shooting, floor generalship, and an on ball creator in the P&R and isolation who can create good shots, but they also lose an off ball threat who’s work as a screener is integral to the team’s success in HORNS sets and also a player who affects spacing simply by being on the floor. There’s a ton of tangible and intangible value with Nash in the mix and that’s magnified even further with Kobe injured.

All that said, whether Nash plays or not the Lakers will need to be a post dominant team offensively. The ball must be worked inside on a majority of their possessions, if only to affect the Spurs’ help defense by forcing them to collapse inside. If there’s one thing we know it’s that Dwight Howard’s combination of quickness, strength, and athleticism can give Tim Duncan problems. In the game from this past Sunday, Howard regularly used his first step to get an advantage on Duncan and then used his strength to get better position so he could finish inside. The Lakers will need to work the ball into Howard in a similar way this series, not just through standard post ups, but by moving him from block to block with screens and on dives to the post out of the P&R to enable him to earn his position. If Dwight can get deep post touches he’ll score on the majority of those possessions and that will influence the Spurs to begin double teaming  and fouling him to try and get the ball out of his hands or make him less affective.

Gasol too must be a featured weapon, working against Tiago Splitter, DeJuan Blair, and Matt Bonner. Pau can offer more versatility than Dwight in that he’ll be stationed all over the floor to try and maximize everything he can bring offensively. When the Lakers go to their HORNS sets, Pau will often be the trigger man up high while the wings set and come off screens. Pau will need to be at the top of his game as a distributor, reading the action in front of him and making the right pass/shot decisions to keep the flow of the offense going. A major key, of course, is his high-low work with Dwight and if the Lakers are to maximize their attack they will need to find a way to keep that action fresh and effective.

That said, just because Pau starts a lot of possessions at the elbow doesn’t mean he has to stay there. In fact, the Lakers offense will be better off if he finds ways to work his way down to the block after starting a set up high. There are plenty of ways to accomplish this, but first is to simply turn down the jumper in order to take a hard dribble towards the rim to create a post up chance. The defense is likely to sag off Pau and rather than using that space as a buffer for his shot, he can close it down by attacking and trying to a spot inside of 10 feet. Second, Pau can turn a quick pass or hand-off from the elbow into a P&R opportunity for him to either pop for a jumper or (preferably) dive to the box to get a post touch. The Lakers don’t have a lot of perimeter threats to occupy wing defenders so they’ll need to get creative with secondary P&R actions like this in order to get their big men the ball in positions where they can do damage. Pau’s decision making after starting a possession as a facilitator will be key to make this happen.

Where the Lakers will need to show the most creativity (and get contributions above what was provided during the regular season) is from their crop of perimeter players. Steve Blake, Jodie Meeks, Antawn Jamison, Earl Clark and Ron will all need to hit the jumpers afforded to them when the defense collapses on Dwight and Pau. Further, they’ll need to also show some offensive variety in how they attack the defense and not solely rely on hitting outside shots. Jamison and Clark will need to be active cutters, working the creases of the defense when their defenders turn their heads. Ron will need find post up opportunities on weak side duck-ins, especially when one of Pau or Dwight are on the bench. Blake will need to mix in some drives to the rim where even if he misses the shot he’s drawing defenders and enabling offensive rebounding chances. Even Meeks can work as a cutter off the weak side to get shots in the paint and/or attack closeouts with a couple of dribbles and either try to hit a shot in close or kick the ball out to another teammate if the defense slides over to help.

Maintaining spacing and effectively moving the ball against such a disciplined defense will be difficult. Especially since the Spurs will try to take away the ball reversal that can so often lead to the quick post ups the Lakers want to feature as a staple of this Kobe-less offense. However, if the team is assertive with their movement of bodies and aggressive when attacking with the ball, they can, hopefully, create makable shots via the template they used last week.

When the Spurs have the ball

There’s an old saying about slowing a great team that involves “cutting off the head of the snake”. To beat the Spurs, this phrase applies in relation to Tony Parker. The Lakers’ primary goal is to limit his effectiveness. To do so, however, is difficult and requires a team effort. Primary defenders must funnel him away from the middle of the floor and into space where help is readily available. The help must step up early and maintain discipline in order to not give up an angle that allows him to slip by to the rim. When shots go up, they should be challenged without fouling. This needs to happen on every possession of every game.

Understand that even if this takes place, he’s still going to make shots. Parker has a wonderful mid-range jumper that he can make from either side of the floor. He also has a great floater that he’ll use when coming off the P&R or when attacking in transition. But if the help is there consistently and the primary defender is doing his job, he can be slowed. (As an aside, expect to see Darius Morris used as a primary defender on Parker over the course of this series. Morris offers good size and lateral quickness and has had some success on Parker this season.)

Of course, Parker is only one piece of the puzzle. The Spurs’ offense is so great because they not only have great players, but because they run a disciplined system that incorporates magnificent ball movement that picks out the open man more often than not. That begins with Parker, but funnels through every player on the floor at one point or another. Key to this is Tim Duncan’s versatility as both a high and low post presence. One of the Spurs’ pet plays is a high P&R with Duncan setting the screen where he pops to the top of the key area. At that point Duncan can either shoot his jumper, attack off the dribble, or start a dribble hand-off sequence with the wing on the opposite side. When running that secondary hand-off option, the Spurs create another P&R where Duncan rolls to down the lane line and that sets up an open shot for him or a skip pass when the defense collapses. That pass often catches defenses in mid-rotation and sets up open jumpers for players like Danny Green and Kawhi Leonard that they knock down with stunning consistency.

For the Lakers to slow this, then, they need to be sharper than ever on their rotations to Duncan at the top of the key and then on the back side after that secondary P&R occurs. The weak side guard (in many cases this will be Meeks) will need to hedge towards Duncan to make him pause on his jumper attempt (enabling his man to recover) and the scurry back to the wing where his man is spotting up ready to either shoot a shot or cut hard to the ball to receive the hand-off. If the Lakers can slow this sequence, they’ll force a reset of the Spurs’ offense and they can run the same action all over again.

Understand, this is what the Spurs do. They consistently test the patience of the defense and look for that key moment when a slight breakdown occurs so they can pounce. Whether that’s from Parker (or Ginobili) creating off the dribble, a quick pass to a shooter (Green, Neal, Leonard, Bonner), or a quick hitting action to Duncan where he can take advantage via post up or on a dive to the rim when the defense is overcompensating, it’s all the same to the Spurs. They want to consistently create a series of hard choices for the defense and then make the right read. All the Lakers can try to do is remain as focused on making the correct choice as often as they can and, in some cases, simply hope the Spurs make a mistake or miss an open shot.

Beyond the system, Parker, and Duncan, the Spurs also have several key role players who will need to be slowed. I’ve already mentioned Leonard, Neal, Green and Bonner as shooters. They must all be marked around the arc and all offer a different dynamic based off who will defend them (especially Bonner who is a classic stretch four and will either be drawing Pau away from the paint or require a smaller player guard him). Another key player who can really hurt the Lakers, however, is Tiago Splitter. In the game last Sunday he broke free for several shots inside the paint that he just happened to miss. He’s crafty in getting into open spaces and has good enough hands to make the difficult catch and still finish inside. He’s developed a nice chemistry with Duncan and can play high-low or block to block with him quite nicely. I don’t expect Splitter to suddenly morph into a 20 point a night scorer, but he can certainly score enough points to shift a game or two in the Spurs way and that’s all it takes to seize control of the series.

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It’s safe to say the Lakers will be heavy underdogs in this series, which is a totally reasonable position to take. With Kobe out and with Nash’s availability uncertain, the Spurs are clearly the better and deeper team. That said, the rules of the game don’t change and there are models the Lakers can use to stay competitive in  this series. It will take massive efforts from Dwight and Pau on both sides of the ball, perimeter players to hit shots, and for the defense to show more discipline than they have all season. Having all those things go the Lakers’ way certainly isn’t impossible, but it’s not probable either.

That said, this is what the Lakers fought so hard for. For this chance. We’ll see how much they have in them starting on Sunday.

The Lakers will face the Spurs in the 1st round of the playoffs and, for all intents and purposes, this is the best match up the Lakers could have hoped for. Not because the Spurs are a bad team — they finished 2nd in the West for a reason — or because there’s some underlying flaw with them that makes them beatable in a series. No, the Spurs represent the best match up for the Lakers simply because they’re not the Thunder, Nuggets, or Clippers. You see, those other teams are all young and athletic with a proven ability to outpace this Lakers’ team. There’s a frenetic aspect to playing those teams that the Lakers simply struggle with.

That’s not the case with the Spurs. They’re calculated and disciplined. They have wildcard players who can change the dynamic of any game (Ginobili and Parker, specifically), but they’re a system team that simply grinds team down with execution. That alone should give the Lakers pause and should be considered dangerous, but the fact is the Lakers are best when playing a slower game and putting a greater emphasis on each possession. And while it took some time (and some injuries) for the Lakers to become that type of team, that’s now who they are. Whether or not that will mean much when this series starts on Sunday remains to be seen. But, it certainly mattered when the teams matched up in the regular season.

So, in our initial examination of this match up, let’s take a look at the season series that was with some key numbers included.

*The Spurs won the season series 2-1, claiming wins in November and January, with the Lakers winning their most recent match up just a few days ago.

*The first game was a nail biter that came down to the final defensive possession. With the Spurs trailing in the closing seconds, the Spurs ran a nice set play to free up Danny Green and he buried a three pointer that ended up being the difference. As an aside, neither Steve Nash or Steve Blake played in  this game for the Lakers. The Spurs had their full roster available.

*The second game was another close contest with the Spurs claiming a three point win by outpacing the Lakers on offense. You may remember this game as the one in which Earl Clark began to show he could be a regular rotation player. Clark was excellent in this game, doing a little bit of everything — from making jumpers to diving on the weak side for finishes at the rim, to creating off the dribble. The Spurs, however, rode Tony Parker (who was excellent after having a subpar game in the first match up) and got the win. As an aside, Pau, Dwight, and Jordan Hill all missed this game with injury (hence Clark getting major run) for the Lakers. The Spurs had every player of consequence available.

*The third game was just the other day so we don’t need to go too much into it. It was the Lakers first game after Kobe tore his achilles and the team needed a win badly to keep in front of the Jazz. The Lakers played with passion on both ends, with multiple players stepping up and got the win. On the injury front, the Lakers were missing Kobe, Nash, and Hill. The Spurs were missing Ginobili and Diaw (as well as a waived Stephen Jackson). Tony Parker was playing in only his second game back after a badly sprained ankle.

*If you’re doing the math at home, the point differential in those games was zero. The Spurs won their games by two and three points, the Lakers won theirs by five.

*Not to rub salt in the wound, but the Lakers are going to miss Kobe’s production in this series. In the two games he played against them he averaged 27.5 points, 6.5 assists (to only 1.5 turnovers), and 4 rebounds all while shooting 51.2%.

*Without Kobe, the star for the Lakers will need to be Dwight Howard who did well against the Spurs in the two games he suited up in. Dwight averaged 19.5 points on 58.3% shooting, 16 rebounds (4 offensive), and 3 blocks. He also drew an average of 8 fouls a game, an important stat considering the Spurs don’t have a lot of big man depth.

*Pau Gasol was poor on offense, but good on defense and the glass. Tim Duncan gives everyone problems (including Pau), but the Spaniard did a good job of contesting his shots and hitting the glass. Pau’s 26 total rebounds (7 offensive) in the two games he played were not quite at Dwight’s level, but very big nonetheless.

*On the Spurs’ end, no single player was incredibly impressive over the entirety of the season series. Duncan, Parker, and Ginobili all shot under 45% over the games they played. Kawhi Leonard played okay, but not great. The only Spur who performed up to his season averages was Tiago Splitter who averaged a double-double on 50% shooting. Keep in mind that these numbers (the good and the bad) come in a very small sample.

*One of the key factors to the series will be pace. In the game the Lakers won, they played at a pace factor of 93. In the game they lost on Green’s jumper, the pace was 89. In the game the Spurs pretty much controlled (but was still close), the pace factor was 103. The Spurs can play at a faster tempo and be effective, but slowing the game down is the only way for the Lakers be consistently competitive.

*The Lakers generally controlled the glass, out rebounding the Spurs by an average of 4 per game over the series. The Lakers grabbed a hair over 11 offensive rebounds a game, but surrendered nearly 10 a game to the Spurs on the other end.

*A key to the Spurs’ success was hitting from behind the arc. They made nearly 40% of their three pointers on 21 attempts a game. From the Lakers end, the good news is that only 16 of those 63 attempts came from the corners. The bad news is that they hit 8 of those 16.

*The Lakers were able to play relatively clean basketball, averaging 13.7 turnovers a game (about a full turnover less than their season average). The Spurs, meanwhile, averaged 12 turnovers a game.

There are several other key stats, but we’ll get to those in the rest of the previews we have planned over the next couple of days. The numbers suggest the Lakers have a puncher’s chance in this series, but of course those are all skewed by injuries (both recent and ones at the time of those games). Not to mention the games won’t be played on these past templates, but on new ones crafted by the head coaches where every match up will be magnified and adjustments will matter a great deal. That said, it’s easy to see why the Spurs are the Lakers’ “best” match up in these playoffs. They’ve played them close three times (winning once) under a variety of different circumstances and groups of players available. If nothing else, that should provide some hope.