Manu Drops 40 on Hawks

ATLANTA (AP) - Manu Ginobili is thriving as the San Antonio Spurs’ sixth man.

Ginobili scored a season-high 40 points, including 24 straight for San Antonio in the first half, and Tim Duncan had 30 to help the Spurs beat the Atlanta Hawks 103-96 on Wednesday night.
“I’ve had some good stretches in my career,” Ginobili said. “Today was kind of impressive. In those three or four minutes, or however many they were, maybe, yeah, it was some of the best.”

The Spurs, who pulled within eight games of Dallas in the Southwest Division, have won four straight after losing four of five.

Entering the game late in the first quarter, Ginobili missed two of his first four shots before hitting six in a row from the field and all seven attempts on free throws.The Spurs led 39-23 at the end of his flurry, and Ginobili had 27 points on 9-of-13 shooting before halftime.

“He was pretty special tonight,” Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. “He’s just a heck of a hard cover for any defense because he does everything a little bit different than most players. I don’t even know what he’s going to do half of the time. Tonight he was really on, and he got us over the hump.”

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