Spurs Championship 2014 Banner, Ring Ceremony Twitter Reaction and Highlights
This is becoming old hat for the San Antonio Spurs. For the fifth time in the last 15 years, the organization opened its home slate with a celebration of the past.
On Tuesday night, Spurs players received their NBA championship rings and unveiled the banner for their 2013-14 NBA Finals win.
The Spurs tweeted out photos of head coach Gregg Popovich and NBA Finals MVP Kawhi Leonard receiving their rings:
On Monday, the normally stoic Tim Duncan admitted that he'd relish getting the fifth ring of his career.
"I don't know about anybody else, but I'm really going to enjoy that moment," he said, per Jeff McDonald of the San Antonio Express-News. "I'm not going to look past it. I'm not going to mentally prepare for the game before I get the rings."
The NBA posted a Vine of Duncan receiving his ring.
Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili have been the driving forces on the court behind the Spurs' success. They all took a moment before the game to pose with their rings.
Fans in attendance inside the AT&T Center received a replica championship ring. You can view it below, courtesy of NBA on TNT:
Championship rings always feature plenty of bling, but it's always cool to see the little details teams add to make the rings a little more personal and unique.
CBS Sports' Eye on Basketball posted a photo of the inside of the ring:
Dan McCarney of the Express-News showed one side of the ring, which features the team's slogan, "Pounding the rock":
Of course, the ring ceremony was only half the fun, with the team's fifth championship banner unveiled a little later in the night:
Spurs legend David Robinson saluted the team:
Team owner Peter Holt said that this championship ceremony in particular was special, with the banner unveiling nearly bringing him to tears, per Tom Orsborn of the Express-News:
The pomp and circumstance had to end at some point, and the Spurs players aren't a bunch to bask in past glories for too long, as evidenced by their continued success.
Veteran Matt Bonner added that the ring ceremony and banner ceremony would be "kind of like the last step in the celebration."
"I know we're all very excited to get to the ring ceremony," he said, per McDonald. "When that's over, that's it."
San Antonio will have little time to rest on its laurels. The team opens with one of its Southwest Division rivals, the Dallas Mavericks, who have strengthened in the offseason with the additions of Chandler Parsons and Tyson Chandler.
The two teams met in the first round of the playoffs last year, with Dallas pushing San Antonio to seven games.
Ginobili spoke about how going the distance against the Mavericks prepared the team for its NBA title push.
"(The Mavericks) did make us better, for sure, and that's the great thing in the West," he said, per Mike Monroe of the Express-News. "This doesn't happen that much in the East. But this really gets you better. It makes you improve and face a tougher challenge from the beginning and the Mavs were, for sure, great."
Beating the Mavs would be a great way for the Spurs to kick off their title defense.
Historically speaking, the odds are in their favor. They're 4-0 in games immediately following an NBA Finals win.
The Spurs are one of the most successful American sports franchises in recent memory, but one thing they haven't pulled off is back-to-back championships. Crossing that off the checklist would be a great crowning achievement for the franchise.
If there's anything the past few years have taught everybody, it's that one should never doubt what the Spurs can do. Critics have been calling for their decline for years, and yet, there they were on Tuesday, celebrating yet another title.
