{"id":1971694,"date":"2026-06-04T10:45:59","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T07:45:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1971694"},"modified":"2026-06-04T10:45:59","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T07:45:59","slug":"jalen-brunson-knew-how-to-close-game-1-victor-wembanyama-didnt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1971694","title":{"rendered":"Jalen Brunson knew how to close Game 1. Victor Wembanyama didn\u2019t"},"content":{"rendered":"
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SAN ANTONIO \u2014 When the game is on the line, where does Victor Wembanyama go?<\/p>\n

As New York Knicks star Jalen Brunson did his thing to win Game 1 of the NBA Finals at the very end, the San Antonio Spurs star looked a little lost in comparison. One mark of the all-time great players is where on the floor they\u2019re at their best.<\/p>\n

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The defenders know how important that spot is for the man with the ball. They must defend it at all costs. Once Brunson\u2019s two feet get there, the play\u2019s over. Even when the Spurs had him locked up in the Knicks\u2019 105-95 win<\/a>, he\u2019d slip a bobby pin out of his hair and pick the lock, as San Antonio wing Devin Vassell can attest.<\/p>\n

This is a game Brunson can play over and over. Give him the ball, give him a screen and he can manipulate the defense until he gets what he wants. Wembanyama isn\u2019t there yet. He\u2019s been the most impactful player in the NBA for months now, and he\u2019s had plenty of spectacular clutch moments in the Spurs\u2019 playoff run.<\/p>\n

But Game 1 showed he needs to work on the structure of his game. Which is fine. It\u2019s the first game of the finals in his third season in the league. He has exceeded every expectation up to this point. He\u2019s learned and improved throughout the Spurs\u2019 previous series, putting his stamp on things in the very end.<\/p>\n

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Now he has to build from here, because Brunson \u2014 who had 30 points on 12-of-31 shooting \u2014 is not relenting. In fact, Brunson had a brutal game until he caught fire in the heat of crunch time. At that same time, Wembanyama missed 3s, blew a floater when he tried to draw a foul instead of going all the way to the rim and dribbled the ball off his foot on the possession that would decide the game.<\/p>\n

For all the things he did well leading up to that point, he could not get his size 20-something shoes to the spot where he\u2019s most dangerous. Wembanyama has a litany of options. His power is his versatility. He is a lob threat who can play in the post, pop out for 3, play off the dribble or pull up from the midrange. There\u2019s a vast collection of good skills to work with, and he can pick which one he wants depending on the matchup.<\/p>\n

But when it\u2019s time to just do the Wemby thing, there isn\u2019t a clear answer as to what that is. He had 26 points on 6-of-21 shooting while going 12-of-13 from the line. He had six turnovers to just two assists. This just wasn\u2019t good enough. His value in these playoffs, though, has been that over the course of a series, he finds the response and wins in the aggregate.<\/p>\n

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\u201cEvery team guards differently. I\u2019m going to figure it out,\u201d Wembanyama said. \u201cYeah, I was bad tonight. It\u2019s not more complicated than that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wembanyama\u2019s primary problem to solve is the battle against the best center he\u2019s faced in this playoff run. Karl-Anthony Towns is well-equipped for the Wembanyama battle. He\u2019s a dangerous shooter, is great off the dribble and has the balance, size and power to finish through Wembanyama. On defense, while Towns has had trouble guarding big-time scorers out in space, the Spurs don\u2019t really have that pull-up artist who can give Towns fits. His power and quick feet allow him to take on Wembanyama in isolation fairly effectively.<\/p>\n

As expected, the Towns matchup forces Wembanyama into decisions he hasn\u2019t had to make throughout the postseason. Because Towns is a three-level threat, Wembanyama sometimes would find himself in no-man\u2019s land on defense.<\/p>\n

The Knicks were smart about having Towns flare out to the perimeter to drag Wembanyama with him while using another action against the current of Wembanyama\u2019s movement. Early in the fourth quarter, the Knicks finally started taking the lead by driving into the space Wembanyama was vacating as he stepped out towards Towns.<\/p>\n

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What You Should Read Next<\/div>\n
\n \"The<\/p>\n
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\n The Knicks couldn\u2019t score over Victor Wembanyama. That helped them win Game 1\n <\/div>\n
\n New York took advantage when Wembanyama was away from the basket, and it helped lead to 23 second-chance points.\n <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s almost not like I have anything to figure out. It\u2019s almost like I have to play normal, not even good,\u201d Wembanyama said. \u201cIt\u2019s just like doing the right things is enough. When we play bad, when I play bad, is when we shoot ourselves in the foot. This is why I\u2019m not worried. We\u2019re going to be so much better. I\u2019m going to be so much better.\u201d<\/p>\n

The margins in this game were small. The Spurs had a 95-94 lead with just under two minutes left when Stephon Castle was late on a closeout to Brunson in the corner, who buried a 3 off the catch. Castle should have done the math a second earlier that he was the one who had to close to Brunson, but that hesitation cost them. The little things like that, the foresight and the execution, are where games are won. Luck is also involved, as the rebound preceding Brunson\u2019s make bounced just over Vassell\u2019s reach.<\/p>\n

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\u201cCan\u2019t just be one half where we\u2019re crashing the glass. We\u2019ve got to help Vic,\u201d Vassell said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got to help the bigs down there. That\u2019s going to be a huge part of this series.\u201d<\/p>\n

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When Brunson buried that 3, something fascinating happened. An arena that has been a stronghold for the Spurs this year, where the Fiesta-colored shirts fill the stands nearly uninterrupted, sounded a little bit like Madison Square Garden. When Brunson hit the game-clincher with 37.8 seconds left, it felt like Alamo Square Garden. The litany of loud, obnoxious, spectacularly cocky Knicks fans bellowed loud enough to transport this game back to New York.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur fans have been fantastic,\u201d Knicks coach Mike Brown said. \u201cThey have been fantastic on the road, and to see them around San Antonio, to hear them in the arena \u2026 \u201d<\/p>\n

That should anger the Spurs. But when Wembanyama stepped to the podium after the final buzzer, he seemed remarkably chill for someone who had just lost \u2014 like someone who wasn\u2019t worried about shutting those fans up in 48 hours.<\/p>\n

Wembanyama does well living in the moment. When asked about the ginormous spotlight on him as he becomes the face of the league on the biggest stage, he said the only thing he feels is the 20,000 fans in the arena. Everything outside of that doesn\u2019t exist once he steps between the lines. The cameras just have operators behind them. The millions of people watching from afar don\u2019t register.<\/p>\n

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This should bode well for him now that he and the Spurs are playing from behind. Game 2 will be intense, as coming back from their 1-0 series deficit will be a monumental challenge. They know MSG will be pandemonium for Game 3.<\/p>\n

But as Spurs coach Mitch Johnson said earlier in the playoffs, he has never seen someone who meets the challenge and steps into the fray with their chest out like Wembanyama.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like that is kind of who he is. He never backs down from the moment,\u201d Dylan Harper said. \u201cHe always kind of steps up and meets it.\u201d<\/p>\n

He\u2019s done it before. He\u2019ll need to do it again.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SAN ANTONIO \u2014 When the game is on the line, where does Victor Wembanyama go? As New York Knicks star Jalen Brunson did his thing to win Game 1 of the NBA Finals at the very end, the San Antonio Spurs star looked a little lost in comparison. One mark of the all-time great players […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[226,241],"class_list":["post-1971694","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-crawlmanager","tag-nytimes-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1971694","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1971694"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1971694\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1971694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1971694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1971694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}