Spurs vs. Thunder preview: The rivalry that could define the NBA’s future is here

Atlantic76ersCelticsKnicksNetsRaptorsCentralBucksBullsCavaliersPacersPistonsSoutheastHawksHeatHornetsMagicWizardsSouthwestGrizzliesMavericksPelicansRocketsSpursNorthwestJazzNuggetsThunderTimberwolvesTrail BlazersPacificClippersKingsLakersSunsWarriorsScores & ScheduleStandingsThe Bounce NewsletterNBA DraftPodcastsFantasyNBA OddsNBA PicksWhat's Next For Lakers?Hollinger's Top ProspectsVecenie's Mock DraftNBA Playoffs The Spurs and Thunder are deep, young and poised to battle atop the NBA for years to come. Kenneth Richmond / Getty Images Share articleIt’s the matchup many NBA fans wanted. The Oklahoma City Thunder and the San Antonio Spurs — the two NBA teams with the best records, 126 regular-season wins between them — took care of business in their respective Western Conference semifinal series. Monday, the top-seeded Thunder and the second-seeded Spurs will tip off in Game 1 of a much-anticipated series to determine the West’s representative for the NBA Finals. Oklahoma City hasn’t dropped a playoff game this run, first sweeping the Phoenix Suns, then taking out the Los Angeles Lakers. Only one of the Thunder’s games have been decided by five points or fewer — a 115-110 Game 4 win to close out LeBron James and the Lakers. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the reigning NBA MVP, had a good series, but the play of the Thunder’s supporting cast was the story in their conference semifinal. Ajay Mitchell was impressive in place of injured guard Jalen Williams. Chet Holmgren and Isaiah Hartenstein made a formidable duo inside. Lu Dort and Alex Caruso were two-way catalysts. Mark Daigneault’s group showed it may be even deeper than last season. After a hard-fought six-game series victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves, San Antonio gets the opponent it actually dominated during the 2025-26 season. In five regular-season games, the Spurs beat the Thunder four times — and three of those wins were by double digits. San Antonio, which advanced to the Western Conference finals for the first time since 2017, beat Oklahoma City in the NBA Cup semifinals, crushed them by 20 points on Dec. 23, then beat the Thunder by 15 in Oklahoma City two days later. NBA Defensive Player of the Year Victor Wembanyama has been a superstar all season long, while a young core including Stephon Castle, Devin Vassell, Julian Champagnie, Dylan Harper and NBA Sixth Man of the Year Keldon Johnson has given opponents fits. The Spurs have only one starter, De’Aaron Fox, who competed in a playoff game prior to this postseason. What have we learned about these teams throughout the playoffs, and what can we expect from an anticipated Western Conference finals? Our NBA writers discuss. Joel Lorenzi on the Thunder: The Lakers, as impressive as LeBron and JJ Redick were in their respective rights, could not scheme for depth. The Thunder pounce in waves. When Isaiah Joe isn’t on, Jared McCain probably is. When SGA is being doubled at a frequency unseen in his postseason career, Mitchell is suddenly shouldering the offense. Hartenstein was a plus-30 in Game 4, a clutch game. Holmgren has missed one shot in the restricted area all postseason. There were so many answers that new ones were discovered in the series against the Lakers. Mitchell’s emergence nullifies the Spurs’ potent, deep guard play — especially if Williams returns from injury as well. The Thunder were missing another creator and another versatile shooter. They uncovered both last round. Dan Woike on the Thunder: The Thunder are a basketball machine built on adaptability. And while the Lakers were incredibly short-handed (their entire basketball identity is built round Luka Dončić), they made the Thunder adapt. The entire game plan was built on forcing players other than Gilgeous-Alexander to make plays, and everyone, for at least one moment or another, did. They were the better team than the Lakers, sure. They didn’t need to hit their A-plus levels to win. But what they did, consistently, was show that they were a group comfortable trusting one another to take the big shots and make the important plays. Law Murray on the Thunder: Simply put, it was so easy for the Thunder to score against the Lakers. Gilgeous-Alexander absorbed the attention of the Lakers’ scheme and personnel. Williams was out for the entire series, and the Thunder still scored 125.4 points per 100 possessions. For context, the Denver Nuggets led the NBA in the regular season with 121.2 points per 100 possessions. Oklahoma City knew who to target, and they enjoyed success offensively all series long — something that may not happen in the Western Conference final or the NBA Finals to this degree. Jared Weiss on the Spurs: The Spurs’ guard play may actually have been the swing factor in the Timberwolves series. Castle was consistently the second star the team needed, while Fox and Harper were able to supply enough transition scoring to keep the team afloat. Wembanyama has been consistent enough this calendar year to set the expectation that he could take over most games on both ends. His play against Minnesota offensively was toward the higher end of the standard he has set, even if he made a critical error of judgement in elbowing Naz Reid to get ejected from Game 4. His defense turned out to be pretty much matchup-proof. But Castle stood out, as he continued to be efficient as a scorer and a playmaker while spending most of the series neutralizing Julius Randle or picking up Anthony Edwards. Harper flipped games offensively in quick flashes, and his defensive pressure allowed the Spurs to do a lot of half-court trapping in an effort to get the ball out of Edwards’ hands. Jon Krawczynski on the Spurs: Wembanyama had a shaky first game from an offensive standpoint, but he dominated the series from then on. The only time the Wolves had a chance to breathe was when he was ejected in the second quarter of Game 4. He was a terror on defense, pushing the Wolves away from the rim and forcing hurried, difficult shots. On offense, he toyed with Rudy Gobert, who won his matchup with Nikola Jokić in the first round. With Edwards limited by knee injuries, Wembanyama was the best player in the series, and that’s why the Spurs are moving on. Lorenzi: The Lakers’ dedicated double-teams were unlike anything Gilgeous-Alexander has seen in the playoffs. It helped him defer to his surrounding depth, and the level of physicality prepared him for what he might face from the Spurs and Castle. As much as Gilgeous-Alexander came to understand when to get off the ball and when to seek his spots, it doesn’t seem like he wants to settle under that level of resistance again. On Friday, he was seen at practice working on fighting through tie-ups and being face-guarded by the Thunder’s video coordinators. The way the Lakers defended him ultimately influenced him, and I imagine it influenced some of the focus in the Spurs’ film room. Woike: The biggest thing we learned is if you’re trying to win a NBA championship, you need to get on the Atlantic seaboard. These teams are so good in the present that it’s possible to forget about how good they’re going to be in the future. In a more immediate sense, I think the Spurs can steal from the Lakers in tilting their defense towards Gilgeous-Alexander and relying on their athleticism in scrambles. I also think the Thunder can use their experience to find advantages and exploit them while trying to force San Antonio’s non-shooters into decisions on the perimeter. Murray: The Thunder aren’t going to panic. They will understand how they’re being defended, diagnose who has it going and either extend leads or stay poised until they can hit a team with one of those patented runs. The challenge the Spurs present to the Thunder is that they have premier rim protection, something the Suns and, especially, the Lakers absolutely didn’t have. The Thunder are going to need to keep their flammable shooting from the semifinals going, because free throws and the paint are going to be harder to access. Weiss: Maybe Wembanyama just makes it easy, but Mitch Johnson and the Spurs coaching staff did a good job with their matchup and schematic choices against the Wolves. Their trap-and-recover schemes against Edwards were effective, and they were good at avoiding mistakes when they were in scramble mode. They had some moments when they couldn’t guard their yard against Edwards and Terrence Shannon Jr., getting beat in isolation or killed on the backside by the Wolves’ bigs. But overall, Wembanyama proved to be so good with his positioning and communication that the guards and wings were free to defend aggressively without worrying about paying a steep price. There should be plenty of traps on SGA when Williams is on the bench. The bigger concern for San Antonio is whether they can stay out of foul trouble. Krawczynski: These young Spurs are ready for the moment. There were reasonable questions if Wembanyama, Harper, Castle and Vassell needed to take their lumps in the playoffs before they were really ready to win, as so many young stars have before them. Instead, these young athletes are delivering lumps to their opponents. They are big, strong, hungry and, perhaps most important of all, have a high basketball IQ. They were the team that executed their game plan with more precision and discipline in their series against the Timberwolves, who had far more playoff experience. Johnson and associate head coach Sean Sweeney, the defensive coordinator, put together an excellent game plan, and the players adhered to it throughout the series to snuff out the Wolves. Lorenzi: The Ajay Mitchell-Jalen Williams dynamic. Their presences should, in theory, make each other’s lives easier. Yes, San Antonio will move Mitchell higher up the scouting report, but not before they decide what to do with Williams. Mitchell’s emergence further unlocks Williams as an off-ball scorer and lessens his load as an on-ball creator, giving him a healthier balance. The best version of Williams is a mixed bag of plays on offense, when he can toggle between playmaking and play finishing, and spend half — if not more — of his energy as a defensive disruptor. Woike: I’ll pick a weird one: How does Dort look? Like he’s indispensable? One of my biggest gripes, generally speaking, is that we view basketball more through transactions and less through competition, but it sure seems like the Thunder have a BIG decision to make in regards to Dort this summer and his $18.2 million team option. If the Spurs can play him off the court by forcing him to dribble/pass and the Thunder can survive, it might make their decision pretty easy for them. Murray: How does increased attention on Mitchell affect both teams? The Lakers threw the kitchen sink at Gilgeous-Alexander, and the Thunder washed their dishes. The next Thunder opponents shouldn’t need to overreact to Gilgeous-Alexander to that degree, and that will also change how Mitchell can proceed. He’s going to rise up scouting reports. There’s plenty of highly flammable tape that there is no excuse to be unfamiliar with the sophomore southpaw’s game. Weiss: The X-factor of this series is Holmgren and his offense. Wembanyama pretty much ignored him as a shooter and ate him up inside the 3-point line, which allowed San Antonio to contain the Thunder’s downhill action, for the most part. Also, Wembanyama runs off pure schadenfreude when Holmgren struggles, so the Thunder can’t let him get too jacked up and start trying to dunk on people. Can Holmgren be a knockdown shooter and pull Wembanyama out of the paint, or force the Spurs to play a pseudo zone? The Spurs will win if Wemby can camp by the rim and lose if he can’t. Simple as that. Krawczynski: Who wins the chess match? As stated above, the Spurs coaching staff was excellent in the second round. Now they face Daigneault, one of the best tacticians in the game, and a Thunder team that never beats itself. The Spurs will not be able to rely on some of the mistakes the Timberwolves committed to fuel their runs. They are going to have to go out and win every minute to take this series. We have seen the Spurs do it in the regular season, but the playoffs have a heightened sense of urgency and attention to detail. The Thunder are so disciplined. Every player understands his role and doesn’t deviate from it. The Spurs will have to be just as focused and exacting. Lorenzi: Not like their odds double or anything, but the Thunder were a favorite entering the second round and handled business. Spectators should be at least a little more confident in them than they were entering these playoffs. The winner of this series — which someone suggested to me this week as perhaps the most anticipated series since the Golden State Warriors and Houston Rockets in 2018 — is likely the champion. Woike: There isn’t a better team in the NBA than the Thunder. Was true in October. Is true today. Murray: I said the Thunder were the team I expected to win the championship back in October. Nothing about their playoff run so far has given me a reason to change my thought on that. But they’re going to need Jalen Williams back. It’s great that the Thunder haven’t missed him in terms of wins and (not) losses, but the Thunder are going to need all hands on deck. Weiss: These are the two favorites to win it, easily. They have wide-ranging offensive options, a clear defensive identity and the only two players left who will command double- and triple-teams all night long. These have been far and away the best teams in the league all season, and nothing has changed now. Krawczynski: What’s not to love? The Spurs have an alien who controls both ends of the court; four wing defenders in Castle, Vassell, Harper and Fox who can stay in front of Thunder guards on the perimeter; and enough depth with Johnson, Bryant, Luke Kornet and Harrison Barnes to adapt as the series evolves. Yes, they are young, but they play a mature game. They want it, and they can absolutely take it. Lorenzi: I’ll go under the assumption that Williams is ready for Game 1. If he returns by, say, Game 3, I think it’ll go seven games. The Spurs are real. I’m not sure the Thunder can win without Jalen Williams. Thunder in 6 Woike: I think the Spurs are uniquely positioned to push Oklahoma City to its limits, but experience and shotmaking should win out, and I trust the Thunder more in both areas. Thunder in 7 Murray:  I’m going to say this series goes the distance, with Oklahoma City winning a Game 7. It will be interesting to see if the time off gets Williams up to speed. But the Thunder would have appreciated the Timberwolves coming through — not just so that the Thunder get an opponent coming off a Game 7, but because the Timberwolves are a familiar playoff opponent that isn’t at full strength. The Spurs are playing with house money getting to this point with this core, and they have all the confidence that comes with beating the Thunder four times this season. Ultimately, I expect the Thunder to have a plan to limit Wembanyama the same way they contained Jokić in the semifinals last year. Weiss: Spurs in 7. I actually changed this answer during Game 6, when the Spurs completely slammed the door on the Timberwolves. It wasn’t the recency bias that the Spurs showed they can have a great shooting night in a big moment, but the way they completely buried the Wolves’ identity in a way that seemed like a massive challenge a few days ago. The Thunder can reach a level of tenacity and precision that makes them the best team in the league, but they aren’t invincible and the Spurs proved that this year in a short, but unforgettable window in December. As we approach June, there is no discernable gap between these two teams if Williams looks close to himself. That’s a huge if, enough to give this version of the Spurs the slightest edge imaginable. This series will probably come down to availability, though the one big unknown for the Spurs is how Wembanyama handles playing essentially 10 more minutes per game against Oklahoma City than he did in the regular season. He has handled the minutes load well so far in the playoffs but the Thunder can make him move around defensively more than anyone. This is a coin toss for a prediction, and I like the fact that the Thunder don’t have defenders to roll over and have three primary creators they can count on right now. Particularly, their ability to get into Wembanyama’s dribble with gap help is going to be at a different level than anything he’s faced before. They just have so many more options than Minnesota and that may be just enough to outlast the Spurs. But San Antonio is playing so well that it wouldn’t be surprising to see them win this in 6. If the Spurs can shoot well, De’Aaron Fox can have some big games and Wembanyama can own the paint, it may not matter how good the Thunder are. Krawczynski: What a treat this series is going to be. These two teams do not like each other. They will tear each other limb from limb. Ultimately, I think Wembanyama’s two-way greatness will be just enough — but I certainly wouldn’t bet on it. Spurs in 7. Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms