The San Antonio Spurs are just one win away from punching their ticket to the NBA Finals after forcing a Game 7 against the Oklahoma City Thunder in the Western Conference Finals on Thursday night.
Unfortunately for the Spurs, they will have to do something on Saturday night that they’ve never done in franchise history — win a Game 7 on the road.
Yes — as shocking as it sounds — the five-time champions have never won a winner-takes-all game on the road, dating back to their first season in the NBA in 1976-77.
Spurs Are 0-5 in Road Game 7s
The San Antonio Spurs are historically 5-6 in Game 7s, with all five of their wins coming at home, the most recent being a 119-96 victory over the Dallas Mavericks in 2014. Their lone loss at home also came against the Mavericks, in an overtime thriller, 119-111, to Dirk Nowitzki and Co. in Game 7 of the 2006 Western Conference Semifinals.
Here’s a breakdown of the five times the Spurs lost a Game 7 on the road:
- 1979 Eastern Conference Finals vs. the Washington Bullets: The Spurs suffered a heartbreaking 107-105 loss in Washington after Bobby Dandridge hit a game-winning jumper with 8 seconds left to deny them their first Finals appearance.
- 1990 Western Conference Semifinals vs. Portland Trail Blazers: The Spurs lost 108-105 in OT after Rod Strickland’s turnaround pass was intercepted, leading to Clyde Drexler’s field goal to tie the scores. Blazers won in the extra period.
- 2013 NBA Finals vs. Miami Heat: The Spurs never recovered from Ray Allen’s Game 6 dagger that forced a Game 7. In the decider, they suffered a 95-88 loss as LeBron James overwhelmed them physically.
- 2015 First Round vs. LA Clippers: The epic Game 7 saw 31 lead changes until a hobbled Chris Paul made a contested running bank shot over Tim Duncan with 1.1 seconds left. It was arguably the best win in Clippers playoff history.
- 2019 First Round vs. Denver Nuggets: The only high-stakes Spurs game in the post-Big Three and Kawhi Leonard era ended in confusion as the seventh-seeded Spurs let the clock run out without fouling in the final 30 seconds. Incidentally, they missed the playoffs for six straight years after this 90-86 loss.
Spurs vs Thunder Game 7
The one positive number is that the Spurs lost all five of their road Game 7s by a margin of seven points or fewer. As such, they’ve never really been blown out — which typically happens when an emotionally exhausted team plays a Game 7 on the road. Perhaps only the Game 7s vs. the Heat in 2013 and Nuggets in 2019 saw them in situations where they were overwhelmed by a more talented team.
It also helps that the youthful Spurs — led by Victor Wembanyama and Stephon Castle — are charting their own course and unfettered by the events of the past.
“As a group, we all want this,” Castle said after the Game 6 win, via The Oklahoman.
“It’s right there in front of us. We feel like collectively that we’re better than this team and we didn’t want to let our fans down on our home court either.
“So coming out here with a chance to go back to OKC and play a Game 7 I feel like is all the motivation we need.”
Spurs vs Thunder Game 7 tips off at 8:00 p.m. ET on Saturday night. The winner will face the New York Knicks in the NBA Finals starting Wednesday.
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