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San Antonio Spurs star Dylan Harper left with a right hamstring injury in Game 2 against the Oklahoma City Thunder.
The San Antonio Spurs already had a ball-handling problem against the Oklahoma City Thunder. Dylan Harper’s injury made it a lot harder to solve.
Harper left Game 2 of the Western Conference Finals with what the Spurs announced as a right hamstring injury and did not return.. That forced even more responsibility onto Stephon Castle, who was already carrying a much heavier creation burden with De’Aaron Fox sidelined by a right ankle sprain. The Spurs lost 122-113.
The result has been one of the most concerning trends of San Antonio’s postseason run: turnovers.
The Athletic’s Jared Weiss posted on X that the Spurs have had three 20-turnover games since mid-November, with two of them coming in the first 48 hours of the Thunder series. Weiss also noted that Castle had 20 turnovers through the first two games.
That number is jarring, but the context matters. Castle is not simply making careless mistakes in a normal role. The Spurs are asking him to initiate offense, beat elite pressure, create late-clock shots and help stabilize lineups that were built to look different when Fox and Harper were available.
Against Oklahoma City, that is a brutal assignment.
Dylan Harper Left With a Right Hamstring Injury, and Stephon Castle Absorbed Much of the Responsibilities
Harper was starting because Fox was unavailable. Then Harper went down, leaving the Spurs without two of their most important guards in the middle of a conference finals game.
Erik Anderson is an award-winning sports journalist covering the NBA, MLB and NFL for Heavy.com. He also focuses on the trading card market. His work has appeared in nationally-recognized outlets including The New York Times, Associated Press , USA Today, and ESPN. More about Erik Anderson
