3 Spurs most to blame for Game 2 choke job vs. Blazers after Victor Wembanyama injury

On Tuesday evening, the San Antonio Spurs suffered their first loss of the playoffs with a tough 106-103 home defeat against the Portland Trail Blazers. The big story of this game was the concussion suffered by star Victor Wembanyama in the first half, which could put his status for the rest of the series in doubt.

Here’s who’s most to blame for the Spurs being unable to pick up the slack in Wemby’s absence, blowing a 14-point fourth quarter lead in the process.

De’Aaron Fox

Fox was brought in to the Spurs at the trade deadline last year for this exact kind of situation–to close out playoff games with his elite scoring and playmaking ability. Of course, the hope was that Fox would serve as a complement to Wembanyama in those scenarios, and not the sole initiator of the offense, but in the star’s absence on Tuesday, Fox was unable to hold up his end of the bargain.

Fox missed several tough jumpers down the stretch of this game, finding himself going up against strong defense from Blazers wing Toumani Camara, and he was also limited as a playmaker in this one, finishing the game with just four assists.

If Wembanyama misses one or multiple games in this series due to the concussion, Fox will have to be a lot better.

Stephon Castle

Coming into the playoffs, there were some concerns about how the Spurs’ younger players would hold up in their first taste of postseason basketball, and the early returns on former Rookie of the Year Stephon Castle have not exactly been encouraging.

Castle finished Tuesday’s game with 18 points, but it took him 20 shots to get to that number, a figure that the Blazers are more than happy to live with.

The guard also turned the ball over three times in this one and was one of the many Spurs who struggled in crunch time of this game.

Devin Vassell

Speaking of younger players, this was also just the second playoff game for wing Devin Vassell, and he too struggled to put the ball in the basket with any kind of consistency.

Vassell finished the game with 16 points on an inefficient 6-16 from the field, and he also didn’t connect on any of his five attempts from beyond the arc.

The talented wing had some good looks at the basket in the final couple of minutes of this game to help the Spurs regain control, but none of them went down, and the Spurs now find themselves heading to Portland without home court advantage, and possibly their best player, with the series tied at 1-1.

Game 3 is set for Friday evening in Portland.

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