Spurs won’t dwell on collapse

San Antonio will play the Lakers in Game 2 tonight.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — One game, that’s all it was. And it’s on to Game 2.

That was the San Antonio Spurs’ attitude Thursday in the wake of their blown opportunity in the opener of the Western Conference finals.

“They’re up 1-0. The important thing for us is to not let the game linger,” San Antonio coach Gregg Popovich said at the team’s hotel in suburban Santa Monica some 141‚Ñ2 hours after the Los Angeles Lakers rallied from a 20-point deficit for an 89-85 triumph over the Spurs.

Game 2 will be played tonight at Staples Center, where the Lakers haven’t lost since March 28. The best-of-seven series then shifts to San Antonio for the third and fourth games.

“It’s huge, obviously,” San Antonio points guard Tony Parker said. “We don’t want to go down 0-2 because it’s very difficult to come back. But we did come back.”

“We’re down one game, that’s all,” said Tim Duncan, who had 30 points, 18 rebounds and four blocked shots in a losing cause. “Our goal is to get to four [wins]. A lot of credit goes to them. Obviously, they played excellent. They came back at us. Kobe [Bryant] took it over.”

The Spurs shot 3-for-21 and committed five turnovers while being outscored 24-13 in the fourth quarter. The Lakers outscored the defending NBA champions 44-20 to finish the game. Bryant had 23 of those points, including 14 in the final period, when he outscored San Antonio by himself.

“We’re very pleased overall with what we did defensively,” Popovich said. “Our problem was we have to keep scoring, and we didn’t last night.”

Popovich bristled when the advancing age of the Spurs was brought up as a possible connection to the loss.

“When we win, we’re the experienced team. When we lose, we’re older than dirt,” he said. “That’s just silly. Sometimes people don’t make shots. We can do some things better.”