On Chasing History presented by Michelob ULTRA, the Spurs take down the Thunder in Game 7 to earn a trip to the NBA Finals.
SAN ANTONIO – As the sun set on the Tim Duncan-Tony Parker-Manu Ginobili San Antonio Spurs’ championship era, the franchise faced a fascinating future.
In the wake of five titles from 1999-2014 and then five consecutive playoff appearances through 2018-19, how would the Spurs rebuild and return to relevance?
Successful basketball, as in life, requires a confluence of luck, timing, intelligence, hard work and talent — and not in equal percentages.
It came together for the Spurs in a way that has them positioned to contend for titles for the next five seasons, if not longer.
They won the Draft lottery in 2023 and selected Victor Wembanyama and then drafted Stephon Castle with the fourth pick in 2024 and Dylan Harper with the second pick in 2025, building a roster around Wembanyama predicated on defense, ball movement and athletic, physical wings.
After six consecutive years of missing the playoffs, the Spurs have arrived in the NBA Finals ahead of schedule, given their youth and playoff inexperience. However, they’re unconcerned about preconceived notions of what a title team looks like.
They beat the defending champion Oklahoma City Thunder on the road in Game 7 of the Western Conference Finals, setting up a Finals series against the New York Knicks.
“Why not picture us holding the trophy at the end?” Spurs veteran guard De’Aaron Fox said. “Just thinking of everything that goes into it – the blood, sweat, tears, travel, everything that we go through throughout the regular season. Then adding another 30 games. That does a lot to your body, but I think we’re built for it. I think we’re prepared for it.”
‘Our confidence is through the roof’
The Association discusses the Spurs' balanced attack fueling its Game 7 win vs. OKC.
These are not your grandmother’s Spurs or your dad’s Spurs. Or even your uncle’s Spurs – you know that uncle who likes to tell you he’s not sure what was more impressive: Bull rider Tuff Hedeman’s 90-point ride at the 1995 San Antonio Stock Show and Rodeo or Duncan’s 32-point, 20-rebound, seven-block, six-assist, three-steal performance against the New Jersey Nets in Game 1 of the 2003 Finals.
These are the new Spurs with Wembanyama, Castle, Harper, Devin Vassell, Keldon Johnson, Julian Champagnie and Carter Bryant, coach Mitch Johnson and general manager Brian Wright. It’s a roster full of players brimming with confidence despite being the second-youngest team (average age weighted by postseason playing time) to reach the NBA Finals.
“Our confidence is through the roof,” Harper, the 20-year-old rookie, said. “We’re all trusting each other, and that’s the biggest thing if you want to kind of get over humps like we did.”
But the old Spurs and new Spurs are connected in meaningful and intricate ways. Duncan, Robinson and Ginobili have attended playoff games, and ex-Philadelphia 76ers coach and former Spurs assistant Brett Brown is around the team. Long-time basketball operations executive R.C. Buford is now more involved on the business side as CEO of Spurs Sports and Entertainment.
And while Hall of Fame coach Gregg Popovich stepped aside amid health issues, he’s the team’s president of basketball operations and dispenses invaluable insight.
When Johnson said before Game 7, “I have a few people that I’m very fortunate to have relationships with that have been through this and so it’s a weird question to ask someone what to expect in a Game 7. And luckily, I have one or two people that I’ve had the opportunity to just see what it’s like,” the presumption is that Popovich is one of those people.
After beating the Thunder in Game 7 in the West Finals, Wembanyama cupped his head with his massive hands when asked about Popovich. The emotions were genuine.
“That’s a guy who’s got more experience as a coach than almost anybody and has been through so many things in his career and so many things right now as ‘El Jefe,’ ” Wembanyama said. “He goes through some things we can’t even imagine. I need to call him. I need to see him.”
Spurs icons David Robinson (left) and Tim Duncan are proud backers of the team’s new generation of stars.
The old Spurs want to see the young Spurs succeed, and the new Spurs want to learn from the old Spurs. The ethos of what’s required to win a title still permeates through the organization, and while Johnson isn’t going to coach the same way Popovich did, the tenets of Spurs basketball still ring true: effort on defense, use the pass to create quality offense (“pass up a good shot for a great shot” is a Popovich proverb) and a commitment to team.
“We have the talent, Fox said. “That’s where it starts. I just tell guys all the time, when you go from college to the NBA, it’s a totally different game. They’ve learned that, and our coaching staff has been excellent for us all year with the film, making minor adjustments, the big adjustments.
“And we have a group of guys who are willing to listen to coaches and willing to listen to one another and we just help each other.”
After winning 34 games in 2024-25, the Spurs were not considered title contenders entering 2025-26. Maybe a playoff team. But not a 60-win team. Not a team playing in the first week of June.
But San Antonio opened the season with five victories and put together an eight-game winning streak in December that coincided with a trip to the NBA Cup where they lost to the New York Knicks. The Spurs beat the Knicks on New Year’s Eve and went into 2026 with a 24-9 record – just two games behind the Thunder, and victories against the Thunder on Dec. 13, Dec. 23 and Dec. 25 were noted throughout the league.
“This team has now been pretty damn consistent for a long time, for over a hundred games for the most part,” Johnson said, emphasizing a point that while young, the Spurs gained experience this season.
“We’ve played in the playoffs without Victor, without Fox multiple games. I don’t know who has as much experience as we do this year in the season of 2025-2026.”
No one-man show in San Antonio
The Spurs win a heavyweight battle in Game 7, taking down the No. 1 seeded Thunder to advance to the NBA Finals.
The Spurs kept pressure on Oklahoma City for the No. 1 seed all season and finished 62-20, just two games behind the 64-18 Thunder. The Spurs had the third-best offense, third-best defense and third-best net rating during the regular season. They rebound, block shots, protect the paint, share the basketball, score in the paint and make enough 3-pointers at an efficient enough rate.
It begins with Wembanyama. At 7-foot-4, he is as unique a player as the league has seen given his skillset. He is dominant defensively and captured his first Kia Defensive Player of the Year Award this season at 22 years old.
During the West Finals, Thunder players dribbled into the paint numerous times, thought twice about shooting and dribbled back out. There is no official stat to capture that, but it has an impact on the other team. His rim protection allows the other four defenders to play aggressive defense. He can erase mistakes.
“There’s a guy on their back line that’s a little different than everyone else’s,” Thunder MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander said. “They funnel everything to him. He takes up a lot of space, which is pretty unique. A lot of teams can’t do that. It’s a really good defense. It’s not impossible to score. It’s very different from every other team in the league. It takes some adjusting to.”
This season, Wembanyama posted 25 points, 11.5 rebounds, 3.1 assists, 3.1 blocks and a steal per game and shot 51.2% overall (34.9% on 3-pointers) and 82.7% on free throws. But other statistics reveal his impact. In the playoffs — and the numbers were similar during the regular season — the Spurs scored 115.9 points and allowed 99.2 points per 100 possessions for a plus-16.7 points per 100 net rating when Wembanyama is on the court. They were break-even when he was not on the court.
“He has such a vision in my opinion of who he wants to be as a person and as a player and the commitment and investment that he puts into that vision is nothing like I’ve ever seen before,” Johnson said.
But this is not a one-man show at all. His teammates are committed to elite defense, and Castle was one vote shy of making the All-Defensive Second Team. He is San Antonio’s second-leading scorer (19.2 points per game) and first in assists in the playoffs. Fox scored, assisted and rebounded at a high level with a bad ankle in the West playoffs.
Vassell is a two-way player and Harper is turning into a valuable rebounder and scorer with his 3-point shooting and finishing ability at the rim. Johnson won Kia Sixth Man of the Year this season, and while his playoff minutes are sporadic, rookie Carter Bryant will be a more consistent contributor. Julian Champagnie averaged 15.3 ppg and shot 38.9% on 3-pointers in four road games against the Thunder, including 6-for-10 on 3-pointers in Game 7.
They have depth with Harrison Barnes, who made two big 3s in Game 6, and Luke Kornet, who had six points, seven rebounds and two blocks in Game 4), was a plus-13 in 13 minutes in Game 6 and had a momentum-changing block on Isaiah Hartenstein in the fourth quarter of Game 7.
Beating the Portland Trail Blazers, a Minnesota team that reached the conference finals in 2024 and 2025 and then the Thunder is an impressive run to the Finals.
“Winning the Larry O’Brien Trophy is a childhood dream,” Wembanyama said, “and having a real shot at it, having a chance, a tangible chance at winning it, I’m realizing a dream. It’s a lifetime chance.
“You never know when it’s going to happen again. The day we win it, speaking for myself, it’s going to be an amazing day of the realization of a dream. It’s hard to bring to words. It’s almost like the meaning of my life.”
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Jeff Zillgitt has covered the NBA since 2008. You can email him at jzillgitt@nba.com, find his archive here and follow him on X.
