Richard Jefferson shot before the game and felt much better than he expected. But still not good enough to play.

So Jefferson, who admitted he tried to do too much too soon, sat his third straight game with a back problem that surfaced as spasms last Sunday in Toronto. Jefferson is aiming for tomorrow's home game against Conference rival Indiana.

"It's almost gone completely gone, but I feel it a little bit," said Jefferson, who underwent an MRI that was negative for structural damage.

"And just feeling it a little bit, if it does come back, then you lose another week. So I'm just going to try to take a couple of more days off and give it a serious try against Indiana. ...

"It's so much better than it was the last few days. It felt really good after that practice we had [Wednesday], then I tried to do more stuff when we were still in San Antonio and it went backward. That was frustrating. It went backward because I did a little too much and didn't give it enough time to rest. So that's what set me back