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2026-27 · Regular season
Victor Wembanyama has ‘plenty’ of goals for Year 4, but he’s not sharing them before the Thunder rematch
The Spurs star said finishing third in MVP voting was no surprise, that the Finals loss matters more than the trophy, and that he loves opening against the team San Antonio beat to reach June.
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Victor Wembanyama has a long list of things he wants from his fourth NBA season. He is just not reading it out loud yet.
“I have plenty,” the Spurs star said Monday after San Antonio’s last practice before opening night, when Hector Ledesma asked whether he had any individual goals he wanted to share. “No, I don’t feel like sharing them right now. Try maybe next time.”
He did share plenty else. Over a session that touched on last season’s MVP vote, the Finals loss to New York, Tuesday’s rematch with Oklahoma City and a trip to Six Flags where he could not ride anything, Wembanyama sounded like a player who has moved past the awards talk and is focused on getting back to June.
“It wasn’t really a surprise”
Wembanyama finished third in MVP voting last season behind Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Nikola Jokić, after averaging career highs of 25.0 points and 11.5 rebounds with a league-leading 3.1 blocks in 64 games. He also became the first unanimous Defensive Player of the Year in league history and made the All-NBA first team for the first time.
Asked in French whether finishing third had surprised him, he shrugged it off. “It wasn’t really a surprise,” he said, in WhyNBA’s translation. “I think it was close, and each of us could have made a case for ourselves in that ranking, but Jokić and Shai each had more arguments than I did.”
Is the MVP trophy a target this year? “It’s a big goal,” he said, “but coming out of a lost NBA Finals, to be honest, it’s not the first thing I think about.”
That loss still frames the conversation in San Antonio. The Spurs went 62-20, beat the Thunder in seven games in the Western Conference finals, with Wembanyama named series MVP after averaging 27.3 points, 10.9 rebounds and 2.7 blocks, and then fell to the Knicks in five games in the Finals. He averaged 26.0 points, 11.2 rebounds and 3.6 blocks against New York.
“The quality of the opponent”
The schedule makers sent the Spurs straight back into that West final. Oklahoma City visits the Frost Bank Center on Tuesday at 9:30 p.m. ET, which is 4:30 a.m. Wednesday in Cairo, the last game of the opening-night tripleheader.
Wembanyama said the short summer had not left the team flat. “Not that long, because the season just ended,” he said of the break, before adding: “We have the time to settle down, retrain and get excited again for this. So we’re ready.”
He also made clear that a marquee opener suits him. “It’s not the main thing I think about, but yeah, of course I love it,” he said. “What I love the most is the quality of the opponent. That’s what we strive for. So when you start playing very good people, it means you’ve made it to a very good place. So this is what I care about.”
Learning from Shai, Giannis and Jokić
Wembanyama spoke at length about the players who have stayed at the top for years, Matt Guzman reported, naming Gilgeous-Alexander, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Jokić. After a first full run to the Finals, he said he now understands what it means “to play nine-plus months of NBA basketball.” “And I wonder how these guys do it for 10, 15 years,” he said. “It’s the most impressive thing about great NBA players.”
On the floor, he described his role in a crowded offense that now runs through De’Aaron Fox, Stephon Castle and second-year guard Dylan Harper as much as through him. “It’s a key of our offense,” Wembanyama said of spacing. “We’ve got so much talent. We know where to put ourselves to give the other guys as much space, and it’s not too hard. The key is being ready to score, because it’s too easy to forget, when you space, that you’re also playing. But you need to be a threat in order to bring the defense with you.”
His preseason was light by design: 13.8 points, 6.3 rebounds and 2.3 blocks in 19.8 minutes a game, ending with 14 points, eight rebounds and two blocks in 17 minutes of a 126-97 win over Sacramento on Friday.
Still room to grow on defense
Coach Mitch Johnson said Monday that the reigning Defensive Player of the Year is nowhere near his ceiling on that end. “There’s a lot of growth,” Johnson said. “He can be a much better communicator. He can recognize things quicker. He can be able to connect his teammates and anticipate things before they happen. His perimeter defense has a lot of room to grow.”
Too tall for Fright Fest
Wembanyama spent his last day off before the season with teammates at Six Flags Fiesta Texas, but he walked the park rather than riding it. “I couldn’t pass the height requirement,” he joked, as Jeff McDonald relayed. He also said a summer team trip to Paris included his first visit to the Louvre, and that the teammate most interested in the art was probably him, with Carter Bryant close behind. Not, he noted, Dylan Harper.
The personal goals can wait. Tuesday night, against the team he beat to reach the Finals, is the first chance to start on them.
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