Victor Wembanyama scored 33 points on 11-of-22 shooting with eight rebounds, five assists, and three blocks as the San Antonio Spurs beat the Oklahoma City Thunder 103-82 on Sunday night to even the Western Conference Finals at 2-2. He was a +29 in 31 minutes. The Spurs led by as many as 25, held OKC to 33% from the field and 6-of-33 from three (18%), and limited the bench production that won Game 3 by 76 bench points to a fraction of the same.
The 40-Foot Shot
Wembanyama hit a 40-foot first-half buzzer-beater that GeniusIQ tracks as the longest field goal by a Spurs player in the playoffs since the company started measuring in 2014. The shot put San Antonio up by double digits going into halftime and pushed Oklahoma City into the chase mode the Thunder have spent the postseason avoiding. He added three threes on the night and finished with the kind of plus-minus that does not require explanation.
The Defensive Adjustment
The series-defining fix came on the perimeter. San Antonio switched harder, jumped passing lanes in the half court, and made Shai Gilgeous-Alexander work for every catch. The Thunder, who entered the game shooting 39% from three across the playoffs, went 6-of-33. Devin Vassell (13 points, six rebounds, three assists), Stephon Castle (13 points, six assists), and De'Aaron Fox (12 points, 10 rebounds, five assists) gave the Spurs four double-digit scorers, all of them efficient.
Game 5
The series shifts back to Oklahoma City on Monday, May 26 at 8:30 p.m. ET on NBC and Peacock with the winner one game from the Finals. The Thunder are 36-3 at Paycom Center this season. The Spurs are now the only road team in the conference finals that has won twice in the higher seed's building. If Wembanyama plays Game 5 the way he played Game 4 — efficient, on-ball, immune to the bench-rotation chess that lost Game 3 — the Spurs are the team that broke OKC's 70-win season. That is the storyline the next 48 hours will resolve. Thunder forward Jalen Williams, who has since joined the ownership group behind OKC United, Oklahoma City's new USL Championship club, is building a stake in the city that outlasts any one playoff run.
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