The Oklahoma City Thunder pretty much have it all. A title. The reigning MVP. A roster that’s the envy of the league, and the best record in basketball. They’re positioned to be the defining team of their era, built to last at a time in the NBA when continuity feels cost prohibitive. Don’t let a little January swoon distract from the fact that this could (and maybe even should) be a dynasty. All the pieces are in place. And still, over the past month or so, the Thunder have found something more: a proper rival. Victor Wembanyama and the San Antonio Spurs are here, now, well ahead of schedule—and in December alone, they won three games against the defending champs, each more emphatic than the last.
Yet the real statement came following the first of those three wins, when Wembanyama—after toppling the Thunder in the NBA Cup semifinals—talked rather pointedly about his team playing “pure and ethical basketball.” Those were the magic words. There was already intrigue between San Antonio and OKC, and even a little personal beef between the otherwise not so beefy Wembanyama and Chet Holmgren. But Wemby’s jab fed an ongoing public debate about the Thunder’s style of play and the calculated manner in which Shai Gilgeous-Alexander creates contact. Those comments went viral for a reason: They made the collision of these two teams about something.
It’s not enough to be across purposes. Rivals have to be across philosophies. Two great teams that respect and understand each other? That’s a dinner party. There is no rivalry without judgment, and Wembanyama evidently has plenty—for Shai’s free throws, for Chet (in both English and French), and in whatever is left unsaid. Whether you agree with Wembanyama’s framing matters less than the fact that he put it all out there—although the fact that San Antonio has backed it up twice over matters even more. This version of the Spurs hasn’t won anything yet, but they carry themselves with the edge of a team that sees it as only a matter of time.
It’s fitting, given how long these two franchises have stood in each other’s way. Since 2012, OKC and San Antonio have played more postseason games against each other than they’ve played against any other opponent. For years the Thunder were the upstart club, built in the Spurs’ image by a former member of San Antonio’s own front office. Now OKC is the proven commodity. It’s a complete inversion of the days when Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook tried to overwhelm the more methodical Spurs with athleticism and exuberance. Those Thunder had to contend with the patience of Tim Duncan, the precision of Tony Parker—veteran opponents who could meet explosion with poise.
The Thunder are the basketball machine this time around, even if their focus defies their youth. This is the beginning of their run, just as it is with San Antonio. Wembanyama and Holmgren, after all, vied against each other for Rookie of the Year in 2024; now they compete for Defensive Player of the Year instead. Only one member of the Thunder’s usual rotation is over 30; Jalen Williams, a star in his own right, is all of 24.
Yet to this point, the only force in the league that’s been able to jam up the Thunder with any consistency is a 7-foot-4 anomaly who welcomes the challenge. Oklahoma City can deny that these games carry extra weight—as is its right, frankly, given all it’s accomplished. None of that erases the palpable tension on the court whenever the Spurs and Thunder meet, and it also doesn’t change the fact that OKC’s road to a second straight title may go through the opponent uniquely suited to thwart its entire way of life.
That starts with Wembanyama, the one help defender on earth who can make Gilgeous-Alexander flinch in the middle of his flow. The Spurs haven’t stopped SGA by any means, but they do force him to adapt; what would be a straightforward iso against any other team feels a little less certain against Wemby, whose length allows him to close otherwise unclosable gaps. He’s always there. The irony in whatever is simmering between Wemby and Chet is that they don’t spend much time guarding each other; the Spurs prefer to have Wembanyama defend the likes of Alex Caruso or Isaiah Hartenstein, or really they’d prefer that he rove in the background without focusing on them much at all.
All of which means that if Shai pump-fakes to shed his defender, Wembanyama can launch from the paint fast enough to blot out any daylight. That forces the best one-on-one scorer in the world to speed himself up, plan ahead, and work around the looming threat he knows is there. And the shooters he kicks out to—especially the ones Wembanyama is ostensibly “guarding”—feel the mounting pressure of that entire chain reaction.
NBA Top 100: Thunder and Spurs
Thunder
- No. 2: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
- No. 16: Jalen Williams
- No. 21: Chet Holmgren
- No. 64: Isaiah Hartenstein
- No. 67: Alex Caruso
- No. 84: Cason Wallace
- No. 86: Lu Dort
- No. 89: Ajay Mitchell
Spurs
- No. 5: Victor Wembanyama
- No. 33: De'Aaron Fox
- No. 47: Stephon Castle
- No. 83: Devin Vassell
There’s danger in reading too much into the fact that two of OKC’s worst shooting games of the season have come against San Antonio; it's less dangerous to observe the reality that the Thunder have looked so far outside themselves in those games. An amazingly deep and resourceful team came up short on answers—a rarity this season. Maybe that will change as J-Dub (whose ongoing recovery from wrist surgery has him wearing a heated glove on the bench) starts to look more like himself or as OKC works Ajay Mitchell back into the matchup after he missed two of those three games against the Spurs. Regardless, that’s a lot of uncertainty for a team that’s been the surest thing in the sport, and it’s amplified by the fact that the Spurs, by and large, have ripped the Thunder’s all-time great defense to absolute shreds.
Oklahoma City spends every game in a frenzy, with some of the most stifling defenders in the league flying around and feeding off one another’s energy. It’s overwhelming—for just about every team except San Antonio. Where the Thunder have Caruso, Lu Dort, and Cason Wallace attacking the ball, the Spurs have Stephon Castle, De’Aaron Fox, and Dylan Harper handling it with care. They have so many players who can find a crease in the defense to keep a play going, which forces OKC’s defenders to scramble to the point of overextension. This is a matchup that hits the Thunder where they live and threatens to upend their greatest strengths.
Threatens to, anyway. One of these teams problem-solved its way through four consecutive playoff series, and the other has yet to experience the postseason at all. It’s wonderful that the Spurs are 3-0 in the season series and have climbed all the way to second in the West. They still have the burden of proof. Even if you subscribe to the idea that the Spurs might be perfectly suited to take down the Thunder, can San Antonio even survive in the playoffs long enough to meet OKC in a series? Does it have the focus to adjust, in the game and in real time, as quickly as the Thunder did on their championship run? Can every young Spur—Wembanyama included—be counted on to deliver in May and June the way they are now? The Thunder are relentless and uncompromising. Sticking a wrench in their works isn’t a lasting solution; in time, the Thunder’s machinery will wear down those counters and chew them up beyond recognition, demanding that the Spurs show them more with every meeting.
That’s because rivalry is in itself a clarifying experience. Playing against a familiar foe over and over prompts refinement. It demands evolution. It shows a team who it is by forcing it to overcome what it’s not. There’s a reason even champions are defined by their opponents; every losing team tells you something about what it took to win—and that’s especially true for teams that meet repeatedly in the playoffs. Battle after battle with the Pacers forced the superteam Heat to become the small-ball buzz saw they were always meant to be. LeBron’s Cavs and Steph’s Warriors pushed each other to new heights of execution with every single matchup.
The Thunder and Spurs don’t yet have that kind of shared history, but they have every ingredient necessary to get there—to become the heavyweight contemporaries that draw greatness out of each other. With enough playoff bouts, Gilgeous-Alexander and Wembanyama could be intertwined forever. The generational scorer and the game-changing defender. The impossible and the machine. A playoff encounter with OKC could suggest what form San Antonio’s roster should take. The challenge the Spurs present could bring about a new, even more dangerous balance in the Thunder offense. These could be the kinds of teams that tell each other’s stories—if only they could meet in the playoffs for the first real chapter.
