Game 12: Wemby Scores Career High 50 Points in Spurs' win over Wizards

(1) Wemby's 50-point night (2) What went right? (3) Spurs player observations

In game 12 of the regular season Wednesday, Victor Wembanyama scored a new career high 50 points in a close win for the San Antonio Spurs, over the visiting Washington Wizards.

The Spurs jumped out to a 16-point lead early in the first quarter, but the Wizards came right back, keeping pace with the Spurs from the 3-point line.

In the second half, the Spurs used a dominant third quarter to open a 21-point lead, but in the fourth, Jordan Poole (42 points) and Corey Kispert (19 points) wouldn’t let the Spurs walk off the floor easily with the win.

The Wizards got the game to crunch time, but the Spurs made enough plays and free throws in the end to win by 9 points, 139-130.

With the win, the Spurs get back to .500 at 6-6, they’re 5-2 at home, and they won their first and only game of the season against an Eastern Conference opponent.

---

(1) Wemby’s Career High 50 Points

Wemby came out of the gate firing from distance, sinking a 25-foot three and then a 28-foot three as his first two makes, with Alexandre Sarr giving him a bit of space on defense.

Those first two made threes were a preview of the kind of night it was going to be for Victor.

Just look at his shot chart from all over the floor:

When it was Valanciunas’ turn to guard Wemby, Victor was able to get good three point looks as well. With Valanciunas being a more traditional center who likes to drop and stay inside the arc, Victor had a lot of daylight to keep shooting triples.

During the third quarter, Wemby had already passed his season high of 36 points and he tied his career high in made 3s with 6 for the third game in a row. A few minutes later, he drilled his new career high 7th and then 8th three pointers in the third quarter. By the time the third was over, Wemby had already scored a new career high 43 points. His previous career high was 40 points in a game from last season.

In the fourth, he started to draw free throws to continue to add to his scoring total. With 48 points, he caught the ball from mid-range, used a jab step, and then sank a mid-ranger for his new career high 50 points.

Here was Wemby’s scoring in each quarter of the game:

• 1Q - 10 points

• 2Q - 14 points (24 total points)

• 3Q - 19 points (43 total points)

• 4Q - 7 points (50 total points)

He put the ball on the floor multiple times to drive past Sarr or Valanciunas on his way to 12 points from the dunk/layup range, where he was perfect on his attempts close to the rim. With his 3-ball falling, he was able to drive in multiple times and finish with dunks as the defense was now biting on his pump fakes, worried he’d make another three.

By going 8-of-16 from three, Wemby has picked his 3-point percentage up for the season to 34% (34-of-99), after he entered the game shooting 31% from three.

He’s also launching 8.3 triples per game, with 49% of his shots now coming from distance according to PivotFade.com.

---

(2) What went right?