The Spurs Had Their Crowd, Their Stars and Their Moment

SAN ANTONIO — Friday at 7 p.m. on the button, Frost Bank Center was filling up, and Louis Korkames was deep into his pregame routine: painting shiny Spurs logos onto toddlers’ faces in the arena’s vast concourse. The calm before the storm. Like many of the 19,034 fans who stuffed the arena, Korkames was no stranger to big games. He’s spent more than 31 years delighting kids with custom facial art, but on Friday his brush was a tad more jittery than usual, given the magnitude of the game about to unfold.

“Oh, it’s crazy, the energy,” he said, waving his paintbrush in the air for emphasis. “It’s double, it’s triple!”

Then he had to get back to painting. It would be a long night.

A series that was already wildly entertaining through two games was indeed at times double and triple the intensity during Game 3, the first Western Conference finals game in San Antonio since 2017. The Spurs fed off their fans’ energy and exploded with a 15–0 run to open the game. Devin Vassell drilled two threes, Victor Wembanyama blocked a shot by freshly minted supervillain Isaiah Hartenstein. De’Aaron Fox and Dylan Harper returned from their injuries. Stephon Castle stapled himself to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. As the Spurs went on their initial run, fans’ primal screams rattled the television cameras, the railings and the rafters.

But crucially, not the Thunder.

In a performance befitting of the defending champions they are, the Thunder quickly chopped down that early deficit, led by seven at halftime and emptied the bench in the final minutes during a 123–108 win to go up 2–1 in the best-of-seven series and retake command after losing Game 1 at home.

“We just went out there and competed,” said Gilgeous-Alexander, who led the Thunder with 26 points. “They obviously jumped on us early. First game in their building, their crowd behind them, they were excited to play. We just wanted to make sure we competed from that point on.”

The Spurs’ opening few minutes were essentially flawless—they led 19–4 before the Thunder found their balance in the form of Jaylin Williams, who hit three first-half three-pointers to help settle his team. Oklahoma City’s bench was relentless for essentially the game’s final 44 minutes—Thunder reserves outscored San Antonio’s bench by a staggering 76–23 margin.

“It was a punch. Credit them, they were ready to play and they got us early,” said Thunder coach Mark Daigneault. “I just thought we showed great poise to understand the 48-minute nature of the game.”

Jared McCain led the Thunder’s second unit with 24 points. Williams added 18 with five three-pointers.

Wembanyama scored 26 for the Spurs, while Vassell added 20 points, four steals and six threes.

Like the first two games, this one also featured several moments of playoff-grade chippiness.

Early in the third quarter, Alex Caruso committed a hard foul on Castle has he drove for a dunk. Castle stood over the Thunder guard for a moment and the fans jeered. Moments later, Castle drove again and was fouled even harder, this time by Ajay Mitchell. Vassell jumped into Mitchell’s face, a few guys quickly popped off the bench, and while no punches were thrown, the heat level was rising. After review Mitchell was hit was a flagrant foul and a technical along with Vassell.

“Just had my teammate’s back,” Vassell said. “That’s my brother, and the first play is a basketball play, but I mean, two times in a row, he’s about to go out for dunk, and you feel like you pushed him. That could be a dangerous play.

“I mean, it’s the playoffs. It’s a lot of stuff that physicality, grabbing, holding all that, and that just builds up. So it’s a lot of, I guess, a little bit of animosity building up, and I’m cool with that.”

Moments later Gilgeous-Alexander drew a soft foul on Castle near midcourt and the chants of flopper, flopper rained down.

Devin Vassell and Ajay Mitchell exchange words. — Devin Vassell and Ajay Mitchell exchanged words, and technical fouls, in the third quarter. | Daniel Dunn-Imagn Images

The crowd at Frost Bank was indeed electric until the final minutes. Their passion is entirely organic but also by design. Last summer Wembanyama worked directly with the team to set up a new fan section, which came to be known as “the Jackals,” a group of about 100 Gen Zers who stand the entire game and belt out European-style chants (Olé, olé, olé!), beat drums and cause general delirium.

Wembanyama also handpicked the fan-section leader, Aiden Sterling, a 26-year-old local accountant who attended every home game, including those during tax season. He even spoke to Wembanyama earlier in the playoffs to calibrate strategy. “Keep the strides going, keep it loud, make sure we’re the hardest arena in the NBA to play in,” Sterling said. “I mean, I don’t think there’s ever been a superstar that takes that much interest. I’ve never felt this connected to a team.”

Despite the fan support, it’s clear Spurs will need more than an enthused home crowd to get through this series. Game 3 revealed cracks that will not be easily mended. Harper returned, but was a shell of his Game 1 self, scoring six points in 17 minutes. Fox hobbled off late in the third and looked gimpy in the fourth. And Hartenstein, Caruso and Chet Holmgren continued to disrupt Wembanyama, who scored 26 points but grabbed just four rebounds, none offensive. The Spurs will need maximum Wemby to win three of the next four.

“It pains me to see them in pain,” Wembanyama said of Harper and Fox. “I feel like I need to make my teammates better.”

After those chippy fouls early in the second half, the crowd got louder and the Spurs got angrier, but the Thunder simply got better. Williams was the spark in the first half, while Gilgeous-Alexander, McCain and Caruso (15 points) kept the Spurs at arm’s length throughout the second. McCain drilled a three from the corner with 10:28 left to give the Thunder a 15-point lead, and the Spurs never got closer than nine.

Now it’s the Spurs who face adversity—this is their first series deficit in these playoffs.

“There’s going to be trials,” Wembanyama said. “Now we’re going to see what we’re made of.”

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