The San Antonio Spurs are headed toward the kind of spotlight teams usually have to earn over years, and the NBA’s next schedule could make that official. A recent prediction has San Antonio lined up as one of the league’s marquee attractions, with the Oklahoma City Thunder, not the New York Knicks, emerging as the rivalry the league wants to sell.
That might sound a little surprising at first, especially with the Spurs and Knicks already building plenty of heat. The two teams met in the NBA Finals and the NBA Cup last season, and New York won both.
Their connection stretches back further, too. In 2024, Victor Wembanyama’s second season, the Spurs and Knicks faced off on Christmas Day, and the Knicks won that one as well.
Before that, San Antonio did beat New York in Wembanyama’s rookie season, even though Jalen Brunson put up 61 points. Wembanyama also tossed the game ball into the stands, which kept it out of Brunson’s hands.
Maybe he should have tried winning the game if he wanted the ball!
Even with that Spurs-Knicks back-and-forth, the league is expected to push San Antonio’s rivalry with Oklahoma City as one of its biggest draws. Last season, the Spurs played the Thunder five times in the regular season and won four of those matchups. San Antonio also beat Oklahoma City on Christmas and in the NBA Cup, then knocked them off in seven games in the Western Conference Finals.
The odd part is that the Thunder are still viewed as being right there with San Antonio, if not ahead of them. Wembanyama has seemed to take that personally, and he’s gone out of his way to embarrass Chet Holmgren both on and off the court.
Apparently, Adam Silver will want to see more of that.
CBS Sports’ Cameron Salerno predicted that the Spurs and Thunder will meet on opening night and again on Christmas next season. In that same projection, the Knicks are set to open against the new-look Philadelphia 76ers and then face the Boston Celtics on the holiday.
The Spurs will still see the Knicks twice during the regular season, and those Finals rematches should still land on national TV. But the bigger picture is clear: the NBA appears ready to keep most of its biggest rivalries inside conference lines. With LeBron James now in the East, there are also more star-driven matchups for the league to lean on.
The schedule hasn’t been released yet, but the signs point to the Spurs being in prime time plenty.
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The Tim Duncan-Steph Curry comparison always starts with style, because the two stars helped define very different eras of basketball. Duncan was the steady force of the Spurs machine, a two-way anchor whose presence translated into year-after-year contention and a trophy case filled with Finals hardware. Curry, meanwhile, changed the geometry of the game with his shooting and pushed the Warriors into a new offensive age, building a legacy that is just as unmistakable even if it looks nothing like Duncans.
Still, the debate gets sharper when the conversation turns from aesthetics to rsum. Duncans case is rooted in consistency, playoff reliability and the kind of championship equity that comes from being the constant in every run, while Currys case leans on revolutionary impact and the way his titles were shaped by a roster that kept evolving around him. For Spurs fans, the appeal is obvious: Duncans greatness never needed asterisk management, and that is exactly why this argument keeps circling back to him. [Read more 🡒]
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Bleacher Report Just Validated What Spurs Fans Always Knew About Tim Duncan
Tim Duncan has always been the kind of player Spurs fans appreciated in the way only they could, with the quiet certainty that his value went far beyond the box score. Bleacher Reports latest defensive ranking only adds another layer to that long-held view, placing Duncan near the top of the all-time list and reinforcing the idea that his best work in San Antonio was often felt more than it was celebrated.
What makes the case even stronger is how complete Duncans defensive rsum really was across his 19-year career. He never won Defensive Player of the Year, yet he still set an NBA record with 15 All-Defensive First Team selections, a reminder that his impact on the Spurs identity was as foundational as his offense and maybe even more underrated than his reputation as a top-10 player suggests. [Read more 🡒]