Spurs Look Like Contenders After Dispatching Blazers ​

After winning a playoff series for the first time in nearly a decade, the San Antonio Spurs look like NBA championship contenders again.

San Antonio knocked out the Portland Trailblazers 114–95 for a 4–1 series win on Tuesday in Game 5. The Spurs decisively closed out a series that the Blazers once threatened to prolong, and the West Conference’s No. 2 seed looks poised to do more.

“That was just one example of how a series can go, and that’s a good way to start the playoffs,” Spurs star center Victor Wembanyama told reporters afterward. “We gained experience. And I’m still hungry for even better matchups.”

Wembanyama, a former No. 1 overall pick by the Spurs in 2023, looks to continue the championship lineage of elite big men in San Antonio. It started with former Spurs star David Robinson, who played a major role in the team’s first championships in 1999 and 2003.

Fellow former star center Tim Duncan teamed up with Robinson during that time, and Duncan led the Spurs to another two championships in 2007 and 2014. Until Duncan’s retirement in 2016, the Spurs were perennial contenders, but a decline followed, marked by six consecutive losing seasons.

San Antonio had won only two playoff series since Duncan’s retirement, and that came in 2017 when the Spurs made the Western Conference Finals. The Spurs now get to rest up for a shot at the conference finals with the semifinals around the corner.

San Antonio awaits the winner of the series between the No. 6 seed Minnesota Timberwolves and No. 3 seed Denver Nuggets, which stands at 3–2 in favor of the Wolves. Both teams have significant issues going into the next round against the Spurs.

Minnesota lost star guard Anthony Edwards indefinitely due to a hyperextended knee, and the Wolves lost guard Donte Di’Vincenzo to a season-ending Achilles injury. The Nuggets have played inconsistently on offense of late, and injuries to forward Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson also don’t help.

Minnesota’s inconsistencies, on full display in a Game 5 blowout loss, could also lead to a Game 7 back in Denver if Game 6 doesn’t go well for the Wolves. The Spurs will receive anywhere from three to five days of rest before the next series.

San Antonio ousted Portland without being injury-free. The Spurs won Game 3 without Wembanyama due to a concussion, 120–108.

Spurs guards Stephon Castle and Jordan McLaughlin in addition to forward Harrison Barnes, also dealt with injuries during the series. Castle notably delivered 15 points and five assists in the Game 5 win on Tuesday.

“It was probably our most professional game of the series,” Castle told reporters afterward. “We punched them in the chest first in a game that mattered, especially when they were on the ropes.”

Spurs guard De’Aaron Fox led the way with 21 points, nine assists, and three rebounds. Fox previously had 28 points, six rebounds and seven assists in Game 4 on April 26.

“Just watching [Fox] play, not really pressing or forcing anything, and then to be able to close a game out like that, it’s a talent,” Castle said. “Having him with us, especially in late, close games when things start getting tight, to have that stability from a vet guard is good to be a part of.”

Fox, who has been with the Spurs since 2024, played his first eight seasons with the Sacramento Kings. He didn’t get to play in the postseason until 2023, his final year in Sacramento, but Fox looked like a well-seasoned playoff veteran on Tuesday.

“I’ve been in the league a couple years now. I’ve faced him a couple times. I’ve been on the opposite side, and it’s not fun to guard him,” Spurs forward Julian Champagnie told reporters afterward. “We want him to be that guy for us, that closer. And he just happens to be really good at it. It’s his world, and we’re kind of living in it.”

Fox is the kind of supporting star or role player the Spurs had in prior championship runs. With the first championship team, the Spurs had guard Avery Johnson, and guards Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili soon followed suit between 2001 and 2018.

“He [Fox] was a Clutch Player of the Year [2023] for a reason,” Spurs head coach Mitch Johnson told reporters. “He’s in a different situation now in terms of at times having the basketball in his hands at that volume every single night in the fourth quarter.”

“He may be as good as any player I’ve ever seen in balancing how to play off it, then when to go on it,” Johnson said. “And when he gets on it, he doesn’t mess around. When we help him with our organization and spacing and give him space to operate, we’ll be even that much better.”