Quatre de faits
LET ‘EM KNOW - Back then, it was relief and relief alone. There was no excitement. There was no fulfillment. It simply came with the territory. You don’t get to experience the joy of your favorite NBA team being a perennial title contender for two decades straight without also suffering some undesired consequences. One example of which is that when you’re a perennial title contender for two decades straight, you never get to enjoy the first round of the NBA playoffs. It’s either win as you are required to do or endure pure unadulterated agony. While first round playoff exits didn’t happen often during the San Antonio Spurs 1998-2017 vicennial run as championship contenders, when they did, it was dreadful.
All told, it happened in four of the 20 seasons. While two of the four were slightly more palatable when factoring in that they involved absences of star players due to injury (2000: Tim Duncan & 2009: Manu Ginobili), it was certainly a huge bummer to be denied an opportunity to properly defend our first-ever title in 2000 (losing to the Phoenix Suns 3-1 as the West’s fourth seed) and similarly disappointing getting bounced 4-1 by an instate rival in 2009 (losing to the Dallas Mavericks as the West’s third seed).
The two most excruciating by far, however, were losing in the first round in 2011 and 2015. As the top seed in the West in 2011, we once again were forced to open the playoffs without Manu Ginobili. While his injury was less severe in 2011 than it was in 2009 (only forcing him to sit out of Game 1 against the 8th-seeded Memphis Grizzlies), it was enough to put us in an 0-1 hole (losing a nail-biter 101-98). This foreshadowed what would prove to be a snake-bitten false start of a title pursuit for a 61-win juggernaut that looked like world-beaters heading into the postseason. We ultimately succumbed to Memphis’ Grit and Grind physicality in six games in such humiliating fashion that it’s hard to imagine it will ever be replaced as the most embarrassing playoff exit of my lifetime as a Spurs’ fan.
We covered the 2015 seven game first round war with the Los Angeles Clippers here at theLeftAhead. The conclusion of the decisive battle in that war rendered the third edition of the Black & Silver blog series shockingly brief given the first edition (2013) was 21 chapters long and the second edition (2014) was 23 chapters long. If you recall, the seventh chapter in 2015 was a tragedy ending in heartbreaking fashion when Tim Duncan missed blocking Chris Paul’s game winning floater by the width of a piece of paper. As brutal as it was to experience, CP3’s greatest playoff moment wasn’t even the most agonizing aspect of the 2015 debacle of a title defense because that matchup with the Clips should have never even happened in the first place.
On the last day of the regular season, San Antonio was in position to clinch the West’s second seed but dropped all the way down to the sixth seed after losing a close road game to the New Orleans Pelicans 108-103. Had we just taken care of business that night, we would have avoided a match up with Chris Paul and Los Angeles until later in the playoffs and also potentially given ourselves a shot to face the Golden State Warriors in the Western Conference Finals before they were the juggernaut Golden State Warriors. Forcing Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and company to actually get tested with facing the defending champions might have delayed their ascent to the top of the mountain for another year or even forestalled it completely. (Do the Warriors get past the Oklahoma City Thunder in the 2016 Western Conference Finals without their 2015 championship experience to draw from? Does Kevin Durant sign there in the summer of 2016 had the Warriors never demonstrated the Bay area as being a viable landing spot for him to choose in order to chase rings?) Instead the Golden State Warriors reached the summit through one of the easiest paths to a championship in NBA history in 2015. What might have been.
I opened with this unpleasant trip down memory lane in order to demonstrate how much fun it has been getting to enjoy a San Antonio Spurs first round series again. Sure, as a 62-win team and the second seed this season, a first round playoff exit would have been a bummer but it would have also been chalked up as a learning experience and part of the process for a young core going through the playoffs for the first time. While the adversity we faced losing Victor Wembanyama to a Game 2 concussion en route to dropping that game at home followed by digging ourselves into double-digit holes during both road games was certainly stressful, the adversity didn’t carry with it the same enormity of the weight of expectation that I (as a Spurs fan) was used to experiencing annually for two decades of my life. Had we lost to Portland in this first round, I would have been devastated to have blown this fairly unprecedented opportunity to show the world how far ahead of schedule we are but ultimately, I would have been content that this first playoff experience was a solid foundational brick upon which to take the first step on our inevitable path to another golden trophy. So, yeah, it was fun to get to sit back and enjoy watching the first without being required to win. That being said, of course won.
Last Tuesday, the San Antonio Spurs eliminated the Portland Trail Blazers from the 2025-26 playoffs by winning Game 5 at the Frost Bank Center 114-95 in a nearly wire to wire dominant performance. We jumped on them early and, in the words of Stephon Castle, “punched them in the chest” by sprinting out to a 17-4 lead in the first four minutes of the game. By the end of the first quarter, we were still cruising right along finishing the period with a 12 point advantage up 36-24 and by halftime, we had extended that lead to a cool 20 up 65-45 at the break. We continued building our lead up to 26 with 8:27 to play in the third before the Blazers inevitably started playing like a team that wasn’t ready to die and began chipping away. While San Antonio had still increased our halftime lead by another point after the end of third quarter (winning the period overall 21-20), Portland shaved five points off of the game-high 26 point deficit in the last eight and a half minutes giving them so momentum heading into the fourth.
If you stepped away to prepare a snack or go to the bathroom during the first four minutes of the fourth quarter, you would have returned to a very different contest considering it was now once again a contested one. Four minutes and four Trail Blazer threes into the fourth quarter and all of a sudden, the Spurs’ lead had shrunk to single digits at 91-82. After a timely Mitch Johnson timeout, the Spurs steadied the ship a bit stretching the lead back out to 13 but once again, the desperation of a team not wanting their season to end proved consequential as Portland once again got within single digit striking distance at 97-88 with 5:46 minutes left to save it. Luckily, for the Moda Center visitors, that was as close as the Blazers would ultimately get as the Spurs were able to figure out a way to get the dam to break by outfoxing the home team down the stretch to win by a comfortable 19-point margin and closeout our first playoff series in nine years.
Wemby had another MVP-caliber two-way performance. While he only put up a pedestrian 17 points, he did it on an uber-efficient 5-7 from the field (1-2 from deep) and 6-6 from the foul line, plus he added three assists for good measure. Volume scoring wasn’t required from our best player on this particular night considering that all of the other four starters plus Dylan Harper off the bench each also had a double-digit scoring night. What was required from Vic (especially when the Blazers went on the inevitable “fighting for our playoff lives” second half run) was otherworldly defense. The Alien had 14 defensive rebounds and six soul-crushing blocks. Victor’s stifling defense was obviously a key factor in San Antonio closing out Portland but as dominant as Victor was on that side of the court, the player of the game was just as dominant down the stretch on the other side of the court. For the second time running, player of the game honors go to 2023 Clutch Player of the Year De’Aaron Fox. Swipa had 21 points, nine assists, three rebounds, and a steal overall but came up huge in the clutch for the second consecutive game scoring 13 points in the fourth quarter, nine of which came in the last 5:46 of the game after the Blazers had cut the lead to single digits for the second time in the quarter. After an up and down start to his second-ever career playoff series, Fox delivered down the stretch in closing out Portland both in terms of his reputation as a clutch player and in earning the contract extension we signed him to this summer. In the fourth quarters of Games 4 & 5, he was exactly the player we are paying him to be and that is one of the biggest reasons we are headed to our first Western Conference Semifinals since 2017.
Last Thursday, we found out who are opponent will be in the second round. Shockingly, a wounded and undermanned sixth-seeded Minnesota Timberwolves squad eliminated Nikola Jokic and the former champion Denver Nuggets in six games, winning Game 6 at the Target Center in Minneapolis 110-98. Unfortunately, the epic rubber match second playoff victory over Denver in three series over the past four years came at a brutal cost with the season of Wolves starting guard Donte DiVencenzo ending in Game 4 of the first round when he tore his Achilles. (I was beyond sad to see DiVencenzo suffer a catastrophic injury. He’s a tough-as-nails competitor, a player I always enjoy watching compete.) Anthony Edwards, Minnesota’s star player, was also injured in the same game. He went down with a hyperextended left knee. Despite losing two starters in Game 4 as well as key bench players who picked up varying degrees of ailments in Game 5, the 6th-seeded but battle-tested Timberwolves have survived their first round match up with the 3rd-seeded Denver Nuggets and are ready for tonight’s second round opener at the Frost Bank Center in San Antonio.
Late breaking reports suggest that Anthony Edwards is expected to play tonight. I’m personally glad to hear that because I always want to face an opponent as close to full strength as possible. Even though Minnesota has lost DiVencenzo for the season, bring on the best possible version of the squad that has made back to back Western Conference Finals appearances because I think the #BlackAndSilver are up for the challenge of not allowing it to become three in a row. That being said, given the pedigree, we know we cannot allow ourselves to let our guard down for one second just because Minnesota is undermanned. This wounded team just sent Denver packing and if you underestimate the Minnesota Timberwolves, you do so out your own peril. I know we’ll be focused and ready for the challenge. Anthony Edwards or no Anthony Edwards tonight, if we keep playing the stellar brand of basketball that we played throughout the regular season and maintained during the opening round, I’m confident we will inch one victory closer to confirming that the dog days are over an a new era of perennial championship contention has indeed begun. If, indeed, the 2026 NBA playoffs proves to confirm this, along with it will return those pesky undesired consequences…but not until next year. For now, there’s still no pressure. Tonight, I’m excited sit back and continue enjoying where this ride takes us. And on that note, may the fourth be with us.
#GoSpursGo
Featured Image Source: Genius
Headline Image Source: San Antonio Express-News
