A violent tornado hit the Thunder. A tornado which took the form of an iron defense and constant aggression from the Spurs. San Antonio has relaunched the Western Conference finals: the victory (103-82) of Victor Wembanyama’s teammates, last night against Oklahoma City, puts the two teams back on par (2 victories each), in a duel of barely credible intensity, between the two teams the most regular of the NBA season.
Wemby calmly assumed his role as leader, both in terms of statistics (33 points, 8 rebounds, 5 assists, 3 blocks) and in the management of the game. “He felt that he had the obligation to set the tone,” said San Antonio coach Mitch Johnson. He wants to take responsibility, he wants to be the leader and he is made for that. HAS”
The series is more indecisive than ever. Will the next round, which will take place Tuesday evening in Oklahoma, definitively tip the scales to one side? Almost nine times out of ten, the teams which led 3-2 in a series which is played in the best of seven matches (the first team to 4 victories is qualified) ended up validating their ticket.
But this series is unlike any other, and we have to believe that nothing will be decided before the last second, the last possession.
Wembanyama kept his promise
Last night, the Spurs did what was necessary to stay in the race, with a very low average age, one of the lowest in the history of the NBA playoffs. Their youth? They use it as a driving force to achieve what no one imagined possible. Two days ago, after the defeat in match 3, Victor Wembanyama said he had to “do more”.
Message perfectly applied on the floor: after six minutes of play last night, he had already scored 7 points, made 2 assists and 1 block. He tried his luck a lot, especially in the first half, finishing with very good success percentages (50% including 42% at 3 points).
The Spurs took the match from the right end, quickly widening a gap which was never filled by the Thunder. “We have to start the matches this way,” Wembanyama assumes. But you don’t just have to strike first, you also have to be consistent. We were more disciplined this time. »The Spurs pressed hard. San Antonio increased the number of interceptions and completely thwarted the defending champion. The Thunder’s success percentages were stark (33% including 18% at three points).
The Oklahoma City players were squeezed by the Spurs’ relentless defense. From the middle of the first quarter, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (19 points, 7 assists) sat on the bench, his gaze lost in space which said everything about his team’s inability to find solutions to the Texan fury. “We didn’t do anything incredible or magical, we just did what we had to do,†Wembanyama tried to calm down. And it’s far from over. There are still six victories to achieve to achieve what we wanted to expect (Editor’s note: the title of champion). »
Spurs and defensive aggressiveness
The Spurs, who had received a visit from their ex-coach Gregg Popovich to cheer them up after their defeat two days earlier, also reviewed their rotation. Were they having serious difficulties managing the passages on the Wembanyama bench? They found the solution: not to take the Frenchman out, to leave him on the floor as long as possible, like these first 9 minutes of the match played in their entirety, a first during these playoffs.
And if he only spent “only” 31 minutes in play last night, it was only because the score was certain, and he left at the start of the fourth quarter never to return.
Texan aggression was contagious. Devin Vassell slammed a block at the start of the match, Julian Champagnie also got into it during the second quarter, and on numerous occasions, the Thunder players found themselves without a solution, at the end of 24 seconds of possession, screwing up the ball in the face of the lack of solution offered by San Antonio.
Everyone understood that the game was not going to escape the Spurs when Wemby scored a 3-point basket… from the middle of the field, literally, at the buzzer which ended the first period. He had never made a basket from this far in the NBA. “In the past, I made the mistake of rushing too much, I imagined that I was going to be opposed, but that’s stupid, deciphered the Frenchman after the meeting. This is a part in which I had to improve and the playoffs also serve that purpose. HAS”
With such an effective defense, the Spurs didn’t need to score much: at halftime they only had 50 points, but the Thunder were down to 38… Their defense is their best asset, and it makes up for the nights “sans” of several of their elements, Champagnie in particular (2 points) or even Keldon Johnson (6 points), two players for whom the reveal of the playoffs does not turn out to be entirely to their advantage.
The gap rose to 25 points and San Antonio calmly managed the end of the match. Wembanyama increased the score: he finished – by far – the best scorer of the match. With 33 points, he is ahead of… SGA, the MVP of the regular season, stuck at less than 20 points.
