Q: Can you update us on the Spurs' practice gym?
? Norman Slocum

A: Unfortunately for the Spurs, there isn't a whole lot to update. Spurs chairman Peter Holt told the team in training camp that the gym likely won't be finished until June, almost a year after its original projected completion date.

One of the biggest problems leading to the delay, Holt said, has been the project developer's struggle to secure enough financing for the site.

The Spurs' practice site ? on the Northwest side just off Floyd Curl Drive and Huebner Road ? will only be one building in a complex. While the Spurs have the money to build their headquarters ? in part because Sean Elliott agreed to defer $4 million of his salary last season ? the developer has had to locate other tenants for the project.

The heavy rains in August and the economic fallout from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks also have contributed to the delay.

Holt said the Spurs considered finding another place to build the gym, but decided that process would take even longer.

When completed, the Spurs' practice facility, which is not too far from where several of the players live, will house offices for coaches and staff and give the team 24-hour access. It also is expected to include two full-length courts plus four additional baskets, weight rooms, a lap pool, a training hill, staff offices and a lounge for players' families.

The Spurs will continue to spend this season practicing at Trinity University and the Alamodome.

Q: Will the Spurs' broadcasters continue to refer to David Robinson and Tim Duncan as the "Twin Towers" during games?
? Lupe Ramirez

A: Probably not. Longtime Spurs radio play-by-play announcer Jay Howard rarely, if ever, used the nickname, and most of those in the media who did have stopped out respect for the victims killed in the Sept. 11 attacks at the World Trade Center.

Incidentally, Robinson and Duncan were never the true Twin Towers. The title originally went to Houston's Hakeem Olajuwon and Ralph Sampson.

"We didn't give ourselves that nickname, so it's not like we take some great pride in it," Robinson said last month. "I haven't decided, one way or the other, whether we should keep it in memoriam of the towers or just drop it. But we definitely don't want it to cause any problems for anybody."

Johnny Ludden