SAN ANTONIO — Jalen Brunson was taking over the closing minutes of Friday’s Game 2, yet again. But this time, Victor Wembanyama finally got in his way and forced a miss. He corralled the rebound and looked to push the ball up the floor to get a final shot to try to even the NBA Finals.
This was the moment he had always dreamed of — the chance at a comeback win for the ages.
The Spurs have a formula for these moments. Get the ball in the hands of one of their guards, put Wembanyama in action, and get him the ball on the move. So as he started dribbling up the court, he scanned the floor, saw Stephon Castle in the corner of his eye, and sent the outlet pass to his trusted guard.
But as the ball left his hands, devastation set in.
Castle was looking the other way. Brunson wasn’t.
The Spurs had pulled off a striking comeback to take the lead in the final minute, working their way back after the New York Knicks were shooting them out of their own building. But all of it hung in the balance, as Wembanyama watched helplessly, hoping Castle would somehow turn around just in time to see the ball coming his way.
“I threw that one away. I messed up,” Wembanyama said after the Knicks beat the Spurs 105-104 to take a 2-0 NBA Finals lead. “We didn’t play great as a team. We needed to win that game. This game was ours.”
The ball plopped off Castle’s back, right into Brunson’s hands, and the dream was all but dead.
In Wembanyama’s eyes was an unmistakable look of heartbreak. The realization that his lack of certainty in the moment led to ruin.
That’s been the Spurs’ problem in this series. The Knicks are a team with conviction, an unmistakable identity with a clear process in the biggest moments. The Spurs are a roulette wheel of exceptional talent, capable of winning a game in so many ways. But the Knicks know they can win a game in the same way, no matter what.
And yet, the Spurs were in the driver’s seat until that moment. They figured things out just in time, got another De’Aaron Fox crunchtime banger, and should’ve had the last shot with the game tied.
Then Wemby threw it away, trying to do the right thing but doing it the wrong way.
“That’s the most frustrating thing,” Wembanyama said. “To throw it away after putting in all this work.”
But the error didn’t stop there. Wembanyama compounded it, going from a blunder to a dagger. He ran up to the Knicks guard, left his feet when Brunson did a pump fake and handed over the keys to the game.
It wasn’t just the pass. It was the lack of control after the pass. It was the tendency of many young players to make a mistake and then overextend to make up for it. But mistakes can’t be erased, only mitigated.
“I’m still very blurry. That’s the whole problem,” Wembanyama said. “I need to have more poise, more control over the game.”
The Spurs were gifted another opportunity when Brunson bricked his second free throw. In the end, they ran a well-executed pick-and-roll between Fox and Wembanyama. The 7-foot-4 Spurs star got off a clean shot in rhythm over an outstretched Mitchell Robinson, clanking it off the back rim and giving the Knicks a shot at history.
The kind of clank that is left up to chance. The kind you can live with.
“I feel like in this moment you need to shoot to score. In moments like this, it’s like results matter more than process,” Wembanyama said after scoring 29 points on 11-for-21 shooting. “We just need to score. I just need to score. That’s the whole point.”
Results vs. process is the ultimate conundrum in the NBA season’s final stage. The Spurs have been an inherently process-based team this season, as they usually need a chain of events to finish a possession in their best player’s hands. The defenses they have faced have focused on disconnecting Wembanyama from the ball on offense and the Knicks have kept him chasing it on defense.
Fox and Wembanyama bridged that divide in this game, a breakthrough that should’ve inspired hope that they could win the championship. But after a blunder and a brick, the Spurs’ chances are historically slim.
They do have the ultimate equalizer, though. Wembanyama has the talent to pull them out of this hole. But does he have the fight? Do the Spurs?
“I think we need to put ourselves in better conditions,” Wembanyama said. “We’re digging ourselves a hole. That’s been the theme so far.”
After Game 2, Wembanyama admitted he could have been better at recovering from the high of the conference finals, but they can’t change the past now. He said the day before that they were like spoiled kids, playing against teams who understand how lucky they are to be in the finals.
“We’re in the finals in just our second or third season, and we don’t even realize it,” Wembanyama said in French, per L’Equipe. “We don’t appreciate how lucky we are.”
Going against Karl-Anthony Towns, who has been vocal about playing while feeling the spirit of his late mother, Wembanyama has been on his back foot for much of this series. Towns has stepped up in a way that has exceeded expectations, but Wembanyama is just trying to live up to the lofty ones he has commanded. Towns has fought for over a decade to get to this moment and he’s playing like it.
His counterpart, Wembanyama, was surprisingly cool after Game 1 and felt confident he would find his adjustments and turn things around. There was no apparent sense of urgency. There wasn’t really one until they were down by 14 approaching crunch time. Then he looked like the idealized version of himself, and therefore the Spurs did as well.
Now the Spurs need to channel that desperation Wembanyama showed after his turnover. They have to play like their season is on the line. It is. Coming back from down 2-0 in what will assuredly be one of the wildest environments the sport has ever seen, it will take the best play of their lives.
The Knicks have proved to be more than just a great shooting team. They are a great team. A historic one. They are one of the most admirable and enjoyable teams to grace the finals in a long time.
That’s what the Spurs are overcoming. Not just game plans and execution. But a spirit. Their mental fortitude, their gut, it’s all being tested. Now is the painful part. They’re not coming back from down 3-0. The youthful “we’ll figure it out” thing ain’t gonna cut it.
The hope was there until it caromed off Castle’s back.
“Am I going to regret it? Yes, of course,” Wembanyama said. “Am I going to use that to fuel me and to fuel us next game? Absolutely.”
Everyone always says they have to lose before they can win. We’re seeing that play out right now. The Spurs could still win it. But it might take a miracle from a man who’s made them happen before.
An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated which free throw Jalen Brunson missed at the end of the game. He missed the second free throw, not the first.
