"Winning on the road in the NBA is not an art, but a learned skill. That's what Spurs coach Gregg Popovich believes.

It can take young players a while to come to grips with the intensity and focus needed to win games away from the comforts of home. On the road, every mistake is magnified, every possession hyper-critical.

As the Spurs proved in Tuesday's 106-103 loss to Milwaukee at the Bradley Center, a game in which a rookie might have helped engineer a victory if not for late mistakes from the team's most veteran hands, even old dogs can struggle to remember old tricks.

"We've always been able to go into places and keep our composure, make less mistakes than our opponents," Tim Duncan said after the Spurs dropped to 0-4 on the road.

"We're making too many mistakes right now.""