The San Antonio Spurs edged the Dallas Mavericks 114-109 on Friday night, but the story was not the win. It was Victor Wembanyama’s 40-point, 13-rebound performance in just 26 minutes, a calculated move to reach the 65-game threshold required for regular-season award eligibility.
Wembanyama entered the game with 64 official regular-season appearances, but his participation in the NBA Cup final was enough to push him to the required threshold. He played exactly 20 minutes before being removed, then returned to the floor for an additional six minutes to add to his stat line. His 40 points marked a career-high and a staggering efficiency in a game he wasn’t guaranteed to play.
“I had 65 before, I for sure wouldn’t have played,” Wembanyama said after the game. His return to action was contingent on a clean pregame warmup after he was sidelined on Wednesday due to a left rib contusion suffered in a collision with Paul George during a game against the 76ers.
The 20-year-old superstar also took the opportunity to critique the 65-game rule, arguing for 75 percent of the season, roughly 62 games, as a more logical standard. “If a guy plays 50 games, 35 minutes a game, that’s 50 times 35, that’s 1,750, right?” he said, before calculating the difference between 75 and 65 games. The room laughed as one reporter quipped, “Of course, the alien gets all of it right.”
Wembanyama’s comments come as several top stars, Cade Cunningham, Luka Doncic and Anthony Edwards, are projected to fall short of the 65-game mark this season. “I think it’d be somewhat unfair, but we’ll see how it turns out,” he said.
The Spurs, who enter the playoffs as the No. 2 seed at 62-19, will now turn their attention to positioning in the Western Conference. Wembanyama remains a leading MVP candidate and the favorite for Defensive Player of the Year and first-team All-NBA honors. Despite his impact, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander leads first-place MVP votes in an ESPN straw poll of 100 media members, 88-0.
San Antonio’s next game is Tuesday on the road against the Memphis Grizzlies, who sit at 49-31 and looking to secure a top-four seed.
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