Twenty years ago, Tony Parker made his NBA debut with the San Antonio Spurs. To celebrate this anniversary as it should be, we decided to heat up the DeLorean and go revisit this first career match.
So here we are on October 30, 2001 near San Antonio, Texas. As the regular season begins, don’t count on Fort Alamo to get all the hype. Admittedly, the Spurs are already in the foreground behind a monstrous Tim Duncan, who will not be long in going to scratch the rewards which prove it (MVP 2002 and 2003), but the attention of the media is rather concentrated between the sudden return of Michael Jordan in Washington and the Los Angeles Lakers’ quest for the Three-peat. It is therefore in a certain calm that a French rookie is preparing to make his debut at the end of October 2001. He has made his ranges on the side of PSG Racing and his name is… Tony Parker. Head to the stadium and we’re not talking about the AT&T Center but the Alamodome, the former home of Gregg Popovich’s team. On the daily menu: the Los Angeles Clippers, a team that could not do better than twelfth place last season. On paper, there is no photo, the Spurs are favorites.
For his first line-up of the season, Pop ‘opts for a five Daniels – Smith – Bowen – Duncan – Robinson. And yeah, no Tony Parker on the horizon, it’s from the bench that our Frenchy will experience his first official kickoff. The start of the match is to the advantage of the Angelinos but San Antonio manages to pick up before the end of the first quarter. Then begins the game of cat and mouse which will last approximately until the end of the third quarter before Tim Duncan and his family finish the job. The record of our national Tony? 20 minutes off the bench for 9 points, 3 rebounds, 3 assists, 2 steals and an irregular address (3/8 overall but a nice 2/3 of the parking lot). More than performance, it is also the symbol that counts. At 19 years and 166 days, TP has just broken a franchise record: he became the youngest player to wear the Spurs uniform in an official match. It will only take him a week to upset Popovich’s plans, sending Antonio Daniels, Duncan’s great mate, to the bench. We will have to wait 16 years to see this titular position be called into question. In the meantime, one of the great forgotten of the Top 75 will have had time to scratch 4 rings, a title of MVP of the Finals and six invitations to the All-Star Game. Did he think he had such a career on October 30, 2001? He alone has the answer.
Twenty years ago, to the day, a certain Tony Parker made his debut with the Spurs. The beginning of a love story that will have lasted 17 years and a big blow of old for all those nostalgic for the golden age of San Antonio.
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