San Antonio Spurs star center Victor Wembanyama struggled to play basketball on Tuesday after learning earlier in the day his grandmother had died in France, a team source said.
Victor Wembanyama Mourning Grandmother’s Death
Following San Antonio’s 124-113 NBA Cup final loss to the New York Knicks, when Wembanyama answered the opening question of his news conference, his eyes began to fill up with tears.
Wembanyama paused and looked down to the floor with his hand resting on his brow. His attention returned to the reporters gathered in front of him and the cameras directed at him.
“Sorry, I just lost somebody today,” he said through tears.
Victor Wembanyama lost his grandmother and then played one of the biggest games of his NBA career hours later. He’s also a 21-year-old human being. I know he talks trash in a sports setting. For those mocking this situation in any way, I hope you better yourself one day pic.twitter.com/XodnhEEUEY
— Josh Paredes (@Josh810) December 17, 2025
Wemby said immediately after he would take one more question.
When asked how the Spurs would grow from the loss, he said, “I guess this is the best practice for important games because … our focus is already on the playoffs. The playoffs are going to be the biggest time of year. So I guess it’s good that we have this experience today.”
The NBA community had been speculating about why Wembanyama seemed off on Tuesday night. The death of a family member will impact any individual while they’re at their job.
The 7-foot-4 big man scored 18 points on 7-of-17 shooting in 25 minutes off the bench. He also grabbed six rebounds in his second appearance back after missing 12 games in a row due to a calf injury.
Spurs Led Knicks For Most Of NBA Cup Final
San Antonio arrived in Las Vegas with its full lineup healthy for the first time this season.
The Spurs led for much of the NBA Cup final before New York went on a 13-1 run that began late in the third quarter to go up 100-95. The Knicks never trailed again.
“After 25 games in, I believe that we’ve shown some signs that we can be a pretty good team,” Spurs coach Mitch Johnson said. “We’ve also shown that we have a lot of areas of improvement. I think that’s where we were living today.”
The Spurs’ NBA Cup final loss came on the heels of a dominant crunch-time performance against the Oklahoma City Thunder in the semifinals.
Dylan Harper Was The Silver Lining
Something good did come from San Antonio’s loss.
Dylan Harper led the Spurs with 21 points and finished 5-of-7 shooting from 3-point range. Entering the title game, the rookie guard had made just two 3s in a single game on five attempts.
“It’s our second time all being out there together,” Harper said. “Just finding out how to play with each other at a high level, I think, comes with time and comes with experience. We don’t got a lot of that. I think over the next course of the season we are going to see a lot differently when we get to close games and stuff like that.”
The NBA Cup championship doesn’t count in the standings, so both teams remain 18-7.
