Despite Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s valiant effort on Saturday evening, the absence of three key players proved too significant for the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 7. Jalen Williams was sidelined due to a hamstring injury, Ajay Mitchell was nursing a strained calf, and Chet Holmgren seemed to be struggling with his own performance woes.
Holmgren, although physically present for 33 minutes of play, contributed minimally, akin to Williams and Mitchell who were benched. Scoring only four points on two attempts, Holmgren’s performance faltered as the Thunder’s aspirations to be the first back-to-back NBA champions since the 2018 Warriors were dashed.
Instead, it is the San Antonio Spurs advancing to the Finals, where they will face the New York Knicks, following a 111-103 triumph. The Spurs exhibited remarkable composure, especially for a Game 7 scenario, on the road, and against the reigning champions, with their charge led by three players aged 22 or younger.
Victor Wembanyama, Stephon Castle, and Dylan Harper shone brightly, contributing a collective 48 points, 20 rebounds, and 11 assists. Their impactful plays during crucial moments transcended mere statistics, consistently delivering when it mattered most. Harper and Castle also collected seven offensive rebounds between them.
The Spurs demonstrated what it means to rise to the occasion, with every player embracing the pivotal moments. In stark contrast, Holmgren appeared overwhelmed. It’s rare to judge a player’s demeanor from afar, but his reluctance to engage with Wembanyama or his teammates was palpable.
Holmgren’s mere two shot attempts were telling. It wasn’t a scenario where he was actively thwarted by Wembanyama or attempting to create plays. Rather, he seemed eager to offload the ball, avoiding any significant contribution.
This is what it looks like to catch a pass, take a look at the guy in front of you, and simply say “no thanks” and hot-potato it right back where it came from, only to basically be forced to try something when it comes back to you and not even being able to stay on your feet.
Meanwhile, this is what Wemby was busy doing to Holmgren.
Let’s also be clear: Wemby wasn’t even Holmgren’s primary defender in this series. The Spurs put wings on him like Devin Vassell and Julian Champagnie as Wemby roamed as a paint protector (he basically met Chet at every turn as a help defender), and yet he still couldn’t find a way to exploit the size mismatches as a seven-footer in his own right.
To even say Holmgren was passive on Saturday night would be giving him too much credit. He was basically invisible. Of the four shots he took, zero came in the second half. Zero! That is inexcusable for a guy who will start a five-year, $239 million contract next season. A guy who was voted Third Team All-NBA this season.
It’s exponentially worse that Holmgren pulled this disappearing act in a game in which the Thunder were, as mentioned, already without Williams and Mitchell. In a game like this, you need more than one guy who can create his own offense, and with those two guys out, SGA needed Holmgren more than ever. It makes you consider this answer from SGA after OKC’s Game 4 loss in which Holmgren tallied just three buckets.
That is what you call saying everything without saying anything. So let’s just say it for SGA: Holmgren needed to get himself going. It’s cool that OKC coach Mark Daigneault did the honorable thing and tried to take the blame for Holmgren’s no-show in Game 7, but nobody’s buying that line. It bears repeating, this is a max-contract and All-NBA player. Holmgren averaged 10.7 PPG in this series, down from 17 in the regular season. He was held to single digits twice. If he wasn’t going to do anything offensively, he couldn’t even manage to pull more than four rebounds in Game 7?
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Sam Quinn
Wembanyama is going to outplay pretty much every opponent on most nights, but OKC needed Holmgren to at least pull his weight in this series. The fact that the Thunder made it to Game 7 despite the Mitchell and Williams injuries and Holmgren laying multiple eggs is a credit to their depth, defense, toughness and the ability of SGA to create offense when he’s not shooting efficiently himself.
Alex Caruso gave SGA all the help he could muster. Jared McCain went out firing. Cason Wallace was a stud. Lu Dort, who was terrible all series, is going to get a pass because more is expected of Holmgren, and it should be. If Holmgren has an even halfway decent game on Saturday night the Thunder are probably going to the Finals.
Holmgren is not going to become the next Ben Simmons. He was sensational all season and great through the first two rounds of the playoffs. Wemby just scares him to death. It wasn’t just this game or this series, either. In four regular-season matchups, he averaged just 10.7 PPG on 38% shooting against the Spurs.
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Holmgren takes this matchup personally. Everyone knows that. Wemby treats him like a little brother. He came into this series wanting to prove himself against Wembanyama. But once he lost confidence, which was almost immediately, he was done in this series.
It will be a problem moving forward, because no matter how good Holmgren is against everyone else, Oklahoma City probably isn’t going back to another Finals without going through Wemby, in at least some capacity, for the next decade plus.
That said, the Simmons comp is striking. We all remember the meltdown Game 7 against the Hawks in 2021 in which Simmons was palpably terrified of even having the ball in his hands for fear of being fouled and having to shoot free throws. He ultimately passed up a wide-open dunk attempt for the defining lowlight of his career. In that game, Simmons took four shots. Holmgren taking two in this one felt eerily similar.
It wasn’t the only reason the Thunder lost, but it was the biggest one. No question about it. Before the series started, I wondered whether Holmgren was up for this battle when I wrote the following:
Holmgren struggled mightily against Wembanyama and the Spurs this season. It was a big reason why San Antonio took four of the five matchups, which I don’t put too much weight on, but it can’t be discounted entering this series. The Spurs know they can beat the Thunder. That’s half the battle.
OKC’s equation changes quite a bit if Holmgren emerges as a legit No. 2 scorer to take some weight off of Mitchell and Williams having to do that. He’s averaging 18.6 PPG on 60/39/88 shooting splits so far, but it’s not the Lakers, against whom he averaged 20 PPG with a big 24-and-12 showing in the clincher, or the Suns on the other side. It’s Wembanyama. Whole different ballgame.
Holmgren takes this Wemby matchup personal. Everyone knows that. He tried to do too much in their regular-season matchups, hunting his own buckets outside the offense. It’s a fine line, because has to be aggressive. OKC probably can’t win if he isn’t. Especially if Williams’ hamstring issues pop back up. If Holmgren gets badly outplayed by Wemby, OKC will have a pretty steep hill to climb.
Indeed, Holmgren was badly outplayed by Wembanyama. And in the end, the hill was too steep to climb.
