Game Thread Playoffs Round 2, Game 1: Spurs vs Timberwolves (0-0) (Mon 05/04/2026) [8:30 CDT]

[onechance87]

There was a stretch where Keldon's scoring kept us in the game. We get blown out without that stretch.
Keldon's D will always be extremely limited and he was on Ant a bunch. I don't fault a weak defender for playing weak D when he's in the right position and trying and active. And he was, he made them work as much as he could.

keldon was killing us this game,Especially in the 1st qtr.

 

[Arguendo]

He also made at least 3 terrible, momentum swing turnovers that cost us the game.

Easily the least valuable player. Repeatedly hurt us on both sides of the ball, did nothing until Steph was forced out of the game

 

[SpurPadre]

Second chance opportunities killed us more than anything tonight.

 

[TDomination]

People already claiming wolves in 5 or wolves in 6 need to calm down. Geez people, spurs played horribly, and somehow almost stole it.

Spurs lose next game then i can understand the cliff jumpers. But let’s give the a chance to see what this team is truly made of

 

[SupremeGuy]

Can you really blame their fanbase when everyone else was saying this will be an easy series for the Spurs?

I haven't heard anyone say it would be an easy win for the Spurs. I had and still have Spurs in 5. Getting these jitters out of the way in the first game might benefit us tbh.

I don't like making predictions but I think we win by 10+ next game.

 

[amans]

So fucking what if their 2nd and 3rd option combined for 33/19?
That's not where we lost the game.
Are you people living in some 2k world where you shut the entire team down and hold everyone to single digits?

The issue is that Conley and Shannon, their 4th and 5th options in the starting lineup, scored 28.
Guess who else scored 28? Castle and Fox.
That's the fucking issue.

I'm done before I get triggered by all these lack of PF takes.

It’s not this or that. We don’t only have 1 problem and eliminate all other problems, It’s a combination of all.
Sure Conley and Shannon can’t be allowed to score 28. But the final 4/5 mins it was Randle getting the touches and getting 2 huge buckets over smaller defenders and getting a foul for 2 free throws. You cannot say he is not a mismatch and an issue for us and that our PF issue is not a problem, that’s ridiculous.
So yes, both of those issues can be problems and you can get triggered all you want because it’s not one or the other. Plenty of issue to solve before game 2

 

[bignono]

Why isn’t Fox coming off the bench? LMAO

 

[MannyIG]

Most people seem to think it was a pretty good luck. You don’t fine. Move on. It was a very makeable shot for him.

Yeah and most people here are usually wrong. "most people think" to justify something instead of just saying why a shot is a good is always a sign you don't know if its actually good or bad. Is it a makeable shot? Sure but notice the moving of the goalposts from it was a good shot to now it was a makeable shot.

 

[Snake Eyes]

Yeah, it’s a wake up. Call. Watch the ugly game film, clean it up. And I think Minnesota comes in somewhat satisfied on Wednesday also. They got a game.

I think Minnesota will come out even more motivated to be honest. We’ll see how San Antonio reacts. I have faith.

 

[Dbreiden83080]

I refuse to get on social media until Wednesday’s game tbh. I absolutely cannot handle seeing T-Wolves fans gloat (as they rightfully should) or other fanbases dunk on Wemby for the next 48 hours

Oh, this was the first year in like 20 years for me that I stopped watching all of the sports talk, sports debate, etc. I don’t pay attention to any of it anymore. I just watch the games..

 

[onechance87]

Second chance opportunities killed us more than anything tonight.

yup..when it mattered most,Which was the 4th qtr.

 

[100%Duncan]

Yah, everyone is hyper-analyzing the last shot when it’s all the fucking stupid mistakes: turnovers, shot selection, etc that came before that really lost us this one.

 

[KDKSpurs24]

None of that happens if Wemby guards him. Game plan seems to be him playing free safety coming in from offball but there's no problems with the personnel. What's Randle going to do, dump it off to Rudy so he can get blocked by a guard or punt it out of bounds?

Randle starts a lot of plays out closer to the perimeter so Wemby wouldn’t be down there for rim protection. And Randle would attack Wemby with his low center of gravity and body him and wear him out with his weight and strength. Even if he can’t score on him. It puts a lot of other spurs in a bind

 

[bignono]

Keldon 6MOY actually makes me audibly laugh. He’s a ghost in playoffs

 

[Ice009]

I think the shot was fine. The problem is I think Jules is very anti-clutch.


But it’s kind of a catch 22 when he was the only reason we were in that position. So we were also technically riding the “hot hand”.

Ahh, it doesn't sit well with me a role player taking the game winning shot or trying to create that shot for himself.

Lebron would pass the ball off to a role player in his first stint with the Cavs and they'd likely miss. There was one game where he was scared to take the shot himself and he passed it to Dean Garrett (their Center) to win the game and he clanged it. I'd rather Lebron have taken that shot himself. Same with this game. I would have rather Dylan take a long three than pass it off to anyone other than Victor. I'd rather my star take that shot or try and make the play for someone else to get a wide open shot.

Yeah, technically Julian might have been the hot hand, but that was two offensive rebounds where AE said he didn't box out and let Champ get to them. I don't really call that the hot hand. It was great, great hustle play from Julian, but not what I would say "hot hand."

 

[MannyIG]

Champ is 3-9 for the season on step back shots.
Made just 5 unassisted 3s all season long.
28% FG on jumpshots after taking a dribble.

I'm not blaming him for missing the shot, he got the most out of the situation, but that's not his game.

THANK YOU.

People see him shooting an uncontested 3 and think that means its open and that is good becuase he's a good CATCH AND SHOOT guy. Champ is not Steph fucking Curry.

 

[Wemby_Island]

Rust in real in playoffs.

At least we defended Jaden McDaniels well.

But all year we all has the same doubts. Vic wants the ball and he wants to score points. He is not the guy that just plays the D and fine with not scoring like Gobert.

Felt like we never developed a sound O game plan around his interior O. He was a force last year in paint. Ever since Mitch took it it’s regressive. We dont have any one now that can get the buckets in clutch minutes.

 

[timtonymanu]

People already claiming wolves in 5 or wolves in 6 need to calm down. Geez people, spurs played horribly, and somehow almost stole it.

Spurs lose next game then i can understand the cliff jumpers. But let’s give the a chance to see what this team is truly made of

I want to have faith but they beat us without 2 of their rotational guys. Edwards doesn't even need to be 100%. Just reminded me of one of those situations where a clearly young and inexperienced team got exposed.

Hope I'm wrong though.

 

[PokerFace21]

Wemby took way too many threes, especially in the first half. 0-8 from downtown.

 

[Kick-Stand]

Second chance opportunities killed us more than anything tonight.

Not really something the Spurs can control when they don't have a power forward. They gotta make up those points elsewhere, e.g. in the Fox vs Conley matchup and with Victor vs Gobert, and they didn't.

 

[Snake Eyes]

Where do you watch the full post games press? Online anywhere?

Don’t bother. It’s frustrating.

 

[tearsofmorningdew]

Ahh, it doesn't sit well with me a role player taking the game winning shot or trying to create that shot for himself.

Lebron would pass the ball off to a role player in his first sting with the Cavs and they'd likely miss. There was one game where he was scared to take the shot himself and he passed it to Dean Garrett (their Center) to win the game and he clanged it. I'd rather Lebron have taken that shot himself. Same with this game. I would have rather Dylan take a long three than pass it off to anyone other than Victor. I'd rather my star take that shot or try and make the play for someone else to get a wide open shot.

Yeah, technically Julian might have been the hot hand, but that was two offensive rebounds where AE said he didn't box out and let Champ get to them. I don't really call that the hot hand. It was great, great hustle play from Julian, but not what I would say "hot hand."

This wasn’t a LeBeta pussing out type grenade he often dumps in the name of being a “team player”. It was within the flow of the offense and was our best shot at a win in that situation. Mitch was subpar but that play wasn’t why

 

[LeBowen]

It’s not this or that. We don’t only have 1 problem and eliminate all other problems, It’s a combination of all.
Sure Conley and Shannon can’t be allowed to score 28. But the final 4/5 mins it was Randle getting the touches and getting 2 huge buckets over smaller defenders and getting a foul for 2 free throws. You cannot say he is not a mismatch and an issue for us and that our PF issue is not a problem, that’s ridiculous.
So yes, both of those issues can be problems and you can get triggered all you want because it’s not one or the other. Plenty of issue to solve before game 2

Conley and Shannon scoring 28 was even fine, Castle and Fox matching them wasn't.
Randle is a good player, but not enough of an issue to warrant a roster change or whatever you guys are implying.
He'd be an issue if he was doing way more than he should be doing, instead he had an average game by his standards.

His advantage should be a disadvantage on the other end, but we couldn't take advantage of it.
We're supposed to be either a way more mobile team with better spacing when Gobert is on the floor or a team that should get Wemby easy looks against Naz/Radnle lineups and we did neither of those things.
I don't care how physical they get, if Gobert isn't on the floor, we need to get to the rim one way or another.

 

[Arguendo]

keldon was killing us this game,Especially in the 1st qtr.

Are you talking about getting scored on by Randle? Yeah, that dudes 6'9" long and athletic, Keldon is 6"4". Keldon will never win that, you just hope he gets in the way.
Keldon scored 11 points on 10 shots, avoided stupid fouls and didn't turn it over on a night the team could make a shot and were giving the ball away. Keldon was not killing us, Fox and Wemby were killing us, Keldon was getting exploited in a mismatch, that's going to happen every game.

 

[SickDSM]

Several observations I made from this game

1. This first one is not really from this game alone but from what I have seen all year. Anthony Edwards hates Victor and always plays with a lot of fire when he sees him. I saw earlier this year during the all-star game when he called out Victor. I have seen it in that commercial in which he insulted Victor. I think the hate comes from jealousy and competition of wanting to be the face of the league granted Edwards says he doesn't want to be the face of the league but I think he's bullshitting when he says that and really wants to be the face. The hate gives him a lot of juice and adrenaline to perform at a high level despite having bad knees. Spurs might just have to concede that they won't be able stop this guy and either focus on quick double teams and have a concentrated effort to stop everybody else.

2. Victor has been shooting like shit since coming back from that concussion. I have a theory that his bad shooting is still the side effects of that concussion injury he had. I remember many years ago back in 2015 Klay Thompson suffering a concussion in the close out WCF game against the Rockets. His shooting in the next series against the Cavs was bad for a few games before he got back his rhythm. I remember Klay saying in an interview once after that series was over that the concussion messed up his shooting for a few games.

3. Gobert I believe is unplayable in this series for the Wolves. This is something the Spurs can exploit if they play smart. The Wolves went on their biggest run in the 4th when he wasn't there.

4. Julius Randle is going to be a problem since the Spurs have nobody of size to defend him, box him out on the boards and he can screen Victor from protecting the paint. Mitch has to do a better job of at least calling out the refs when Julius is grabbing and holding and setting illegal screens on Vic on the defensive end.

5. Fox is trash. I don't have to explain that. This is the series where he really proves his worth going forward.

6. I have said for years coaching is overrated in the NBA since Players determine 90 percent of the game and at best coaches determine the 10 percent. In a series like this the 10 percent could really determine whether the Spurs win or lose since both teams are closely matched. Mitch made some dumb decisions that cost his team the game while Finch made some decisions that gave his team the edge to win.

7. The refs are not allowing the Spurs to play physical in these playoffs. We saw it against the Blazers how they were allowed to hack with impunity but the Spurs were called for ticky tack fouls when they tried to play physical. This game was the same type of situation with Castle fouling out and other guys getting in a foul trouble. Mitch needs to bitch and complain about this stuff because that's what coaches do to influence how the game will be called.

8. This is going to be a close series that I believe will go to 7 games. I can't imagine the Wolves continue to barely squeak by every game and win in a sweep or 5 games. They will also lose some heartbreaking games where things don't go there way. Eventually it will even out.

Ant doesn't hate Wemby. He brings out his competitive fire because he respects him so much as a player. Ant's got that dawg in him. You'd know if he hated him.

Rudy is never unplayable. It's vital that he gets some buckets because he plays a lot more fiery on defense then. Mike Conley is only getting minutes because he's directing the offense. That's exactly what Rudy does on D. Randle is extremely lazy when Rudy isn't playing.

The coaching is more important than 10% based on the fact that the staff dictates style of play. Wemby taking dumb shots tonight is on the coaching staff. Not calling a timeout to tell the guys to get back in the paint and abuse the only bigs in the game that were in foul trouble is also on the coaches.