The San Antonio Spurs had just lost Game 3 of the Western Conference finals in demoralizing fashion.Oklahoma City had beaten them by 15 points on the Spurs’ home court to take a 2-1 series lead, and San Antonio decided to have a closed-door meeting immediately following the game.Subscribe to read this story ad-free Get unlimited access to ad-free articles and exclusive content.This wasn’t just any team meeting, though.
In the locker room were front office personnel, trainers, various staff — people who wouldn’t normally be in there postgame.“We closed the doors.
‘We don’t let anybody know what’s going on in here,’ Spurs guard De’Aaron Fox later recalled on a Peacock broadcast, evidently breaking the meeting’s one rule.Moments later, the door opened.
“We see Pop come in, and it’s like, ‘ahhhh,’ ” Fox said, raising his voice in excitement.Gregg Popovich, the former Spurs head coach, wanted to convey a message to the team.“That’s BS.
That’s not how we play basketball,” he said, according to Fox.The Spurs came back to beat the Thunder in seven games and make the NBA Finals, their first appearance since 2014.Not many people expected them to be here, in large part because they have such a young team, centered around Victor Wembanyama, Stephon Castle and Dylan Harper, all of whom are in their early 20s.
Their head coach, Mitch Johnson, is 39 years old, too, and in only his first full season at the helm.But San Antonio’s secret weapon this postseason might be Popovich, its former coach who has offered words of wisdom at every critical juncture.He may not be on the bench but he is very much involved on the periphery.
He hangs around the practice facility, sits in on film sessions and gives the players pointers, maybe in a quiet conversation to the side of the court or via text message after the game.Or he might deliver his messages in a more forceful way, like in that closed-door meeting in the Western Conference finals.
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