Sept de faits
Helicopter - Isn’t it lovely when you call your shot in a blog post on what’s about to happen in a basketball game and then everything you predicted comes to pass pretty much exactly how you predicted it? I’m not necessarily saying you can find me right here levitating above all of the prognosticators, pundits, and so-called experts (who get paid handsome sums of money to do this for a living) even though I’m squeezing this project into every spare minute I can find (outside of the 60 to 80 hours per week I’m currently dedicating to building the labor movement) and I’m doing it strictly for my love of the craft of writing, my love for the game of basketball, and most of all, my devotion to the San Antonio Spurs. What I am saying unequivocally, however, is my pedigree and track record speak for themselves. I know this project went on hiatus for seven years (more or less) so If you don’t believe me, peep the back catalogue. Or if you don’t want to bother, that’s fine too. I’m not writing for clicks (this blog series isn’t monetized) or to be in competition with the virtuosos (game recognize game) or to receive acclaim for my erudition (my cup is full from the occasional glance of affirmation I get from my cat). I’m completely secure in the quality of my work. I’m writing because I’m an artist and therefore I must. I’m writing to connect with a deeper consciousness. I’m writing for permanence. And I’m writing about the San Antonio Spurs, specifically, because I’ve been obsessed with this team since the age of eleven and as Twain advised, “write what you know.” I’ve thought about Spurs basketball every day for the past 36 years. You’ll be hard pressed to find a bigger or more knowledgeable fan and you’ll find it nearly impossible to find one who writes like this. I write when the San Antonio Spurs are in the playoffs for myself because it brings me joy. Whether or not it gets read and appreciated by other people now or at any point in the future is immaterial. For me, I’m right here levitating either way. It’s up to you to decide for yourself whether or not one of the most prolific Spurs writers and historians of an entire generation has been right here hiding in plain sight.
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On Tuesday night, Victor Wembanyama, his elbow and the entire city of San Antonio took the declaration that the Spurs don’t lose two in a row to frost bank, vanquishing the Minnesota Timberwolves 126-97 ✅ As predicted, coming back from the shot heard ‘round the world ejection in Game 4, Wemby was a colossal combination of amped up and locked in from the opening tip scoring 16 points and grabbing five rebounds in the first five minutes of the game ✅ The ascending greatest player in the world went on the have one of his most dominant performances of the series posting an imposing 27 points (9-16 from the field, 2-5 from deep, 7-9 from the line), 17 rebounds, five assists, and three blocks. Wemby had the play-of-the-series so far with just under five minutes left in the fourth when he pump-faked his fellow French national team mentor and friend Rudy Gobert out of his shorts before dropping a dime to Julian Champagnie for the lay with Rudy spun out in the completely wrong direction. (Don’t forget to watch the Dylan Harper reaction 😂 I love that Dylan Harper meme faces are now a thing.) With a plus/minus of +24, it’s safe to say that our superstar while seeking atonement achieved exactly that. Vic was special in Game 5 ✅ The Timberwolves made their runs but after jumping on them 24-9 early, we pretty much led wire to wire. Minny squared the game once in the second half at 61-61 with 7:51 left in the third but never got a lead and then fell quickly back into a double-digit hole from which they never escaped. In the blink of an eye, that double digit hole was 30. On Tuesday, the #BlackAndSilver played our brand of basketball, imposed our will on the opponent and stamped Game 5 with another emphatic home W. Proper trajectory for the series resumed ✅
Speaking of that run the Wolves made to start the third quarter, the one that enabled them to tie the game at 61-61, the player of the game is Stephon Castle. After outclassing Minnesota for most of the first half, we went cold down the stretch of the second quarter and as a result, what should have been a 20+ point lead at the break was only 12. So when we came out of the locker room slower than an NBA investigation into Kawhi Leonard-Steve Ballmer-Aspiration salary cap circumvention and the drought continued for several minutes while the Wolves kept making shots, it was safe the say we were once again facing some real adversity. You know, the type of adversity our lack of playoff experience is supposed to require us to buckle under. Minnesota is a hard-nosed, credentialed playoff mainstay with an eye on a third straight trip to the Western Conference Finals. The entire history of basketball says the moment they caught us at 61 in the third quarter of Game 5 on our home court in a 2-2 series, they had us. Our lack of experience was supposed to be our undoing in that moment. Instead, it was baptism by the fire and fury of a 21 year-old second-year iconoclast who doesn’t have the experience and just doesn’t care. To give all credit where it’s due, the response to Ayo Dosunmu’s bucket that tied the score at 61 started with a momentous triple by Julian from a Wemby assist. That small crack of daylight allowed every Spurs fan to exhale but also, that was all Stephon Castle needed to bulldoze down the door. On the next Minnesota possession, Steph spring-boarded over Gobert to snag the rebound and immediately drew the fourth foul on Jayden McDaniels (the Wolves best perimeter defender). He then brought the ball up the court on the left, drove right around a double-screen set by Julian and Victor and (with Anthony Edwards guarding him) crossed over left into a lightening-quick spin back right for a running four-foot bank shot. This ridiculous display of speed and power put the Spurs back up five. Minny got an open Terrence Shannon Jr. corner three corner three on their next possession which missed but Gobert snagged the offensive rebound. Vic was out of position to guard him at the rim but Keldon Johnson wasn’t. KJ swooped in to block the dunk attempt and knock the ball off of Rudy. After receiving the inbound from the turnover, Castle sprinted back up the right side of the court, threw the ball into Wemby in post but continued cutting to the basket with unrelenting determination. Vic dropped it back off to Steph who spring-boarded again off of two feet like he was shot out of a cannon for a power dunk. 7-0 run San Antonio. Dosunmu hit a floater over Julian to temporarily slow the barrage but before the Wolves could fully set their defense after the made basket, Steph was back at the top of the key taking Shannon off the dribble with a behind-the-back dribble into a runner that sat up gently on the rim before falling through. Julian stole the ball on the next Wolves possession and got it back to Castle on the break who initiated some ball movement that kept the defense off balance and resulted in a Keldon drive into a bully ball lay in at the basketball. In the blink of an eye, and at the exact moment that NBA history would’ve have informed that they Spurs would collapse due to our lack of experience, Stephon Castle aka The Iconoclast led the Spurs on an 11-2 run that restored a nine point advantage and, for all intents and purposes, put the game away for the playoff novices. Steph finished the night with 17 points, five assists, and four rebounds but it was his dominance in this critical stretch that earned him player of the game honors. I think he showed the entire NBA punditry where they can shove their ideas about how informative the San Antonio Spurs lack of experience is in assessing our chances of winning it all. (By the way, if you thought we were going to go through this entire season of Black & Silver without discussing Kawhi Leonard’s tree planting philanthropy, you were sorely mistaken.)
While the young team seeking to restore the moniker “Titletown, TX” (as soon as exactly four weeks from today) has overcome every encounter with adversity we’ve come up against in the 2026 NBA playoffs and past every test so far, we haven’t seen a greater test to date (and one fraught with a higher likelihood for new adversity) than the test we face tonight at the Target Center back in Minneapolis. Closing out the seventh-seeded Portland Trail Blazers at home was one thing. Closing out the team that has the second-most recent playoff success of the six teams remaining in the hunt and doing it on their home floor is going to be an entirely different challenge. The Minnesota Timberwolves are not a candidate for, “One, two, three…Cancún!” They are going to come ready to play tonight relishing the opportunity to still flip this series on it’s head one more time (and prove the so-called expert narrative accurate that we have to take our playoff lumps first before we can compete for a championship). As much desperation and resiliency as we can count on Ant Edwards and his band of stone-cold competitors to play with tonight, I am extremely confident we can get this thing done in six if we can match their energy and physicality because there is no arguing that from a talent standpoint, Minnesota is overmatched. Knowing the mindset of Victor Wembanyama and the sidekick he wants to play with for the next fifteen years aka Stephon Castle, matching the home team’s energy and physicality will not be an issue tonight.
While I think I’ve sufficiently conveyed my Spurs fandom bonafides enough already in this post, because I live in Colorado, one of the areas I’m currently lacking is that I don’t get to be in SA experiencing this incredible run with my favorite city in the world. All told, I lived in San Antonio for 16 years and was living in the city for most of the Tim Duncan-era (up to and including the 2014 championship). I moved to Denver in July of 2014 and have been following the team mostly from afar ever since. Back at the beginning of April, I attended the Saturday afternoon epic regular season duel between Nikola Jokic and Victor Wembanyama at Ball Arena. The Nuggets squeaked it out 136-134 in overtime but, despite the loss, it was one of the greatest regular season games I have ever attended. For weeks after that, I assumed we would get a chance at revenge and redemption in the second-round of the playoffs against the team that was maintaining and eventually secured the third-seed down the stretch of the regular season. My hopes of seeing The Alien battle The Joker for as many as seven games (and having an opportunity to see another Spurs playoff game in person, something I haven’t gotten to do since Game 5 of the 2019 first round matchup between Denver and San Antonio) was squashed by this very same too dangerous to every be counted out Minnesota squad. As mentioned in Deux de moins, I personally know plenty of Timberwolves fans and (because, living in CO, I root for the Nuggs any time they are not playing the Spurs) I distinctly remember them laughing their way all the way into this second round matchup with us after eliminating Denver in Game 6 of that first round matchup. Tonight, I fully expect the better team to do exactly what we don’t have the experience to know that we aren’t supposed to do and in the process, remind Wolves fans that the same thing that made them laugh will make them cry.
#GoSpursGo
Featured Image Source: peermusic
Headline Image Source: Sports Illustrated
