Victor Wembanyama led the San Antonio Spurs to a 122-115 double-overtime win against the Oklahoma City Thunder. This was game one of the NBA Western Conference finals.
Wembanyama scored 41 points and grabbed 24 rebounds. He hit a three-pointer to force the second overtime. He then scored nine of the Spurs' 14 points in that second overtime. San Antonio gave the defending champions their first playoff loss this season.
Wembanyama, 22, said his performance was "sheer willpower." The French star played 49 minutes. He made two dunks and a key block late in the second overtime to secure the win.
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Start Your News DetoxThe Spurs' victory in Oklahoma City means they now have home-court advantage in the best-of-seven series. The winner of this series will go to the NBA Finals.
MVP Award Fuels Wembanyama
Wembanyama said seeing Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander get his second straight Most Valuable Player trophy before the game made it more personal. Wembanyama won Defensive Player of the Year but finished third in MVP voting.
Spurs coach Mitch Johnson agreed that seeing Gilgeous-Alexander with the MVP award "100 percent" motivated Wembanyama. Johnson noted his star is very competitive.
Wembanyama said the team's main message was that the young Spurs are "ready to go in any environment, in any place, against anybody." He added that their effort should be above everyone else's.
Rookie Dylan Harper, filling in for the injured De'Aaron Fox, scored 24 points and had seven steals for San Antonio. Stephon Castle added 17 points and 11 assists. The Spurs have now dominated the Thunder this season.
Oklahoma City aimed to be the first team to repeat as champions since Golden State in 2017 and 2018. They had a league-best 64 regular-season wins. However, they lost four of five games against the Spurs. San Antonio won 62 regular-season games to return to the playoffs for the first time since 2019.
Gilgeous-Alexander scored 24 points. He started slowly but helped the Thunder try to come back from a 10-point deficit in the fourth quarter.
Thunder's Effort to Rally
Alex Caruso led the Thunder with 31 points. Jalen Williams returned from a six-game injury absence to score 26 points.
Oklahoma City was down by 10 in the fourth quarter. They fought back to tie the game at 99-99 with 33.2 seconds left. Wembanyama then scored to put San Antonio up 101-99.
Gilgeous-Alexander tied it with a layup. Chet Holmgren blocked Wembanyama's shot at the buzzer, sending the game to overtime.
Gilgeous-Alexander's dunk put the Thunder up 108-105 with 57.6 seconds left in the first overtime. But Wembanyama hit a three-pointer to tie it, forcing a second overtime.
Gilgeous-Alexander said he knows what his teammates are capable of. He added it was unfortunate he "wasn't able to bring my best game tonight." He noted that sometimes that happens, and you have to keep going.
The Thunder had swept the Phoenix Suns and LeBron James's Los Angeles Lakers in the first two rounds. They will try to recover in game two, which they will host on Wednesday. The series then moves to San Antonio for games three and four on Friday and Saturday.
The winner of this series will play either the New York Knicks or the Cleveland Cavaliers in the NBA Finals.
