San Antonio Spurs Found Their Sharpshooter

On Monday night, the San Antonio Spurs lost to the Oklahoma City Thunder, 112-107. The Spurs struggled to play physical basketball, but newcomers Stephon Castle, Harrison Barnes, Riley Minix, and Malachi Flynn all showed promising flashes despite the loss.

The Spurs were led by Julian Champagnie, who went 6-of-13 from behind the arc on the way to a game-high 22 points. He was the only player to take more than four threes, and with the exception of Malaki Branham and Sandro Mamukelashvili, he was the only Spur to make multiple shots from deep.

Last season, he shot 36.5 percent from deep and was quietly one of the better shooters on the team. As Devin Vassell slowly recovers from injury, the Spurs are looking for a starting shooting guard to take over, and Champagnie's effectiveness might give him the nod.

In seasons past, he would often get discouraged when he couldn't find the basket and would stop shooting after missing two or three in a row. In Monday's loss, he did miss three straight but continued to pull the trigger. He credits his increased confidence with his ability to find his role as a knockdown, catch-and-shoot threat.

"Just go in there and shoot, that's my job," said Champagnie. "Confidence-wise, I have to be confident, if I'm going to be one of the team's shooters, you gotta shoot through makes, misses."

Champagnie said that the game plan was not for the Spurs to shoot a lot, but figured if he, or anyone else, was open, they might as well let it fly. He broke it down rather simply: "Just shoot when you're open."

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Riley Minix also was solid from three, making two of his three attempts in limited action.