IYou’ve seen enough: Give the San Antonio Spurs the keys to Santa Claus’s workshop. Put Stephon Castle in charge of assembling the toys. Let De’Aaron Fox throw gifts down stacks, of any scale he wants. Devin Vassell can customize your Christmas cookies. Harrison Barnes covered the elven army. Naturally, Santa Claus’s sleigh had to immediately be sized to fit a taller, slimmer pilot so that the towering Victor Wimbanyama could pilot it comfortably. The red-hot Spurs have taken down the Oklahoma City Thunder three times in two weeks, revitalizing the NBA season. I now have more confidence in Spurs’ ability to delight fans than I do in any old holiday myths.
It looked terrible for a while there. The Thunder may have won the Larry O’Brien Trophy in June, but they’ve started this season on a more dangerous note. They have 24 wins in their first 25 games (the only loss being a 20-point upset comeback). For most of it, Jalen Williams, the second-best player, was on the sidelines recovering from wrist surgery. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the best of them all, rarely had to play in the fourth quarter. The Thunder beat the Sacramento Kings by 31. The Los Angeles Lakers, who some expected to be a reasonable contender, lost by 29; Basketball talent Luka Doncic looked like he was playing against ten men. The Phoenix Suns’ initial grit led to a close loss by just four points. When they met again 12 days later, the Thunder won by 49. This game brought down all the remaining leaves from the trees and started winter 10 days ahead of schedule. Oklahoma City seemed capable of tearing apart anything in its path, even the Golden State Warriors’ legendary 2016 regular season record of 73-9.
The Thunder don’t play a particularly attractive style of basketball. They skillfully exploit the referees’ dilemma over which fouls to call (a consistent whistle interrupts the flow of the game, an absent whistle allows players to get away with blatant violations), often leading to a Gilgeous-Alexander foul. Shooting free throws After whistles that are best swallowed, while Alex Caruso’s mosquito swarm incarnate appears to be free to do whatever he likes in defence. Some claim to enjoy or admire Gilgeous-Alexander contorting his body to get slight bumps from defenders. I can only assume that these same people also like to be kicked hard between the legs. Not to mention the man of the mountain, Luguentz Dort, who flies off his feet to the opponents after too many suspiciously light touches. This deception enables haters to harbor the fantasy that in a world of perfect management, the Thunder would be an average team. True basketball heads know it’s more infuriating than integral to the Thunder’s success, but the overall annoyance is enough to prompt some fans who might otherwise be neutral to root for Oklahoma City’s downfall.
Domination can be very exciting to watch, but historically great performances tend to inspire less awe the more times they are repeated. How often does anyone really want to watch a team beat another team by 35? In the end, you remember that drama is the goal. The Thunder have been draining the season of excitement, building a lead over other teams in the table as well as on the floor.
Within 21 minutes of the first matchup between the Spurs and Thunder this season, San Antonio trailed by 16, and looked as likely to go the same way as any other team. Instead, they’ve done hell to the Thunder ever since.
Against Spurs, the Thunder look deadly. Every member of the team deserves huge credit for that, but this is Victor Wimpanyama’s team, and the Thunder know it. “They have this guy on their team who is seven-foot-five and takes up a lot of space on the field,” Jalen Williams He saidwith some exasperation, when asked what made Tottenham so difficult. At 7 feet 1 inch, Thunder’s pro player Chet Holmgren is the tallest player on the floor in most games, and he has the freedom to grab rebounds and knock down blocked shots. Besides Wemby, he is short, rude, and even shy. Wimbanyama’s disdain for Holmgren is evident in how he celebrates every time Chet misses a free throw, as if he had won the lottery; The way a little extra poison corrupts him; The way He told reporters He doesn’t consider Holmgren a competitor. (There’s actually no debate about which player is the best.) At this rate, Holmgren should expect Wimpy to burst out of the closet, talking loudly, when he heads for a snack.
Wimpanyama and Tottenham made their most emphatic statement yet at Christmas, beating the Thunder by 15 on their home soil. San Antonio took the inevitable early blow well again, recovering to put up 41 points on the league’s best defense in the first quarter. Fox easily found small holes in this defense to the tune of 29 points. The Spurs even held Gilgeous-Alexander to a season-low 22 points. He tried to make up for it by making passes to open up his teammates behind the arc, but they let him down by thwarting almost every attempt.
A Thunder optimist might say that enough of those threes will go the next time around for a tougher win or loss, but I’ve found the misses to be symptoms of dysfunction. Aside from his silky-smooth jump shot, Gilgeous-Alexander is the most consistent mover in the league. He is difficult to guard and impossible to stop. (LeBron James recently showed Some tips On how to slow him down: “You’ve got to keep him away from the free-throw line. Which is tough.”) But even he can’t run the offense on his own. Spurs put Gilgeous-Alexander under enough pressure that he had to delegate more than usual, and his supporting parts collapsed under the heavy load. Caruso and Dort are good at making the occasional 3-pointer, however Accreditation Having to hit the long shot is the last place the Thunder want to be.
Spurs’ surge couldn’t have come at a better time. Not only have they firmly established themselves as title contenders — some say they’re too young, and inexperience has already held a lot of great teams down in the playoffs, but the 23-7 Spurs aren’t contenders, hardly anyone is — but they’ve allowed fans to see the Thunder in a higher resolution that other teams can’t even come close to revealing. Oklahoma City, which was possibly the best team in history two weeks ago, is just an exceptional team. If you take Gilgeous-Alexander’s word for thatTottenham are better now. 74-8 off the table. With the Spurs trailing by just two and a half games, OKC is busy maintaining its lead in the Western Conference. Even if it’s just against one team, the Thunder have taken on the role of unfamiliar pursuer, trying to solve the team that torments them the way they torment so many others. With their newfound weaknesses, the Thunder have become a little easier to enjoy and a little harder to hate. Any future victories against Tottenham will be much more meaningful.
They’ll get a few, maybe (or maybe, but thanks to Spurs it’s a difficult word to choose) sooner this season. Thunder is too good to stay down for long. When they do advance, Spurs will eventually have to make their own adjustments. How terrifying is this: Wimpy is probably still a few years away from his peak. Birthdays and NBA seasons can blend together, with only the most important ones being remembered years later. Whatever happens next, Spurs have given me enough reason to look at these guys and smile.