The Spurs will soon get down to business. Oklahoma City, Cleveland and New York are on the program for the next few weeks. In the meantime, San Antonio is taking advantage of more affordable opponents to string together victories (6 in a row in the regular season, a first since 2019) and allow the return to form of its French nugget, Victor Wembanyama.
Already dominated in great ways on Thursday in Texas, Washington once again lowered its flag against the Spurs last night (113-124). San Antonio has never trembled. Midway through the second quarter, the Texans already had a twenty-point lead and the Wizards were never really able to come back. Deprived of their two Frenchmen, Bilal Coulibaly and Alexandre Sarr, Washington was far too weak and San Antonio was not asking for that much.
The offensive weapons are fairly well distributed this year among the Spurs and everyone played their part in last night’s success: leader De’Aaron Fox (27 points), very effective from afar (5/7), guard Stephon Castle (18 points), whose penetrating qualities often caused opposing fouls (9/13 on free throws); or Luke Kornet, the solid pivot (20 points, 12 rebounds).
Wembanyama still on the bench
Kornet takes full advantage of Wemby’s still imperfect form. Victor Wembanyama once again started on the bench, for the fifth consecutive time after missing a month of competition following a calf strain. The staff intends to protect him and avoid a relapse, while the Frenchman’s last 12 months have been troubled by health concerns, notably a venous thrombosis in the shoulder which kept him away from the courts for ten months.
“That’s the plan for now, until it’s not,” said Spurs coach Mitch Johnson. The season is long and challenging, and it’s not about focusing on the short term. The schedule is unforgiving, so we have to continue to take things one day at a time. »
Even as a substitute and limited to 21 minutes, Wemby managed to do well. He finished with 14 points, 12 rebounds, 2 blocks and 2 assists, crossing the 500 “assists” mark since his NBA debut. He hardly played in the last quarter but he had done the job before: an easy dunk at the start of the match, another, angry, on Vukcevic in the second quarter a few seconds later… Being blocked, or even a race in the middle of the entire opposing team to finish all alone at the basket.
The job was too easy against a Washington team which is languishing at the bottom of the Eastern Conference standings, and which did not put in the necessary intensity to prevent the Frenchman from shining. The last match where Wemby can play while walking: from Tuesday, it’s the Thunder who show up in San Antonio, for a revenge of the NBA Cup semi-final won by forceps by the Spurs ten days ago.
