{"id":470584,"date":"2025-12-13T06:58:12","date_gmt":"2025-12-13T06:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/470584\/"},"modified":"2025-12-13T06:58:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-13T06:58:12","slug":"when-will-san-antonio-spurs-star-victor-wembanyama-return-to-nba-action-after-calf-injury","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/470584\/","title":{"rendered":"When will San Antonio Spurs star Victor Wembanyama return to NBA action after calf injury?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Oklahoma City Thunder has matched the best 25-game start in NBA history and will seek out another victory when it faces San Antonio Spurs in the NBA Cup semifinals in Las Vegas on Saturday night.<\/p>\n

Thunder and 2015-16 Golden State Warriors are the lone teams in NBA history to win 24 of their first 25 games. Golden State also won Game No. 26.<\/p>\n

However, Spurs will have star centre Victor Wembanyama back on the floor after a 12-game absence due to a calf injury. <\/p>\n

Oklahoma City owns a franchise-record 16-game winning streak with the victories coming by an average of 20.8 points. The last three contests were decided by a total of 100 points (21, 30 and 49).<\/p>\n

The defending champion has reeled off five straight wins in NBA Cup play by an average of 24.8 points, including Wednesday night\u2019s 138-89 steamrolling of the visiting Phoenix Suns.<\/p>\n

ALSO READ | Oklahoma City Thunder demolishes Phoenix Suns<\/a><\/p>\n

A victory over the Spurs in the West final would place Oklahoma City in Tuesday\u2019s title game against either the Orlando Magic or New York Knicks. Those two squads battle in the East final on Saturday.<\/p>\n

Last season, Thunder reached the NBA Cup championship game before losing 97-81 to the Milwaukee Bucks.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe should be in a good position,\u201d reigning MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander said. \u201cWe\u2019re doing a lot better than we did last year. We\u2019ll see how it goes and go out there and try to get two Ws.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spurs are feeling pretty good themselves by winning 17 of their first 24 games. Learning Friday that Wembanyama will be back was a big development for them.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel great. I\u2019m ready to go,\u201d Wembanyama said during a media session in Las Vegas. \u201cI think we\u2019ve done the right things over however long it\u2019s been, the past few weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n

San Antonio coach Mitch Johnson said Wembanyama would be under a minutes restriction and would be subbed out of the game earlier than usual.<\/p>\n

\u201cI expect him to play,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cStill ongoing conversations of what that looks like.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spurs went 9-3 with Wembanyama on the sidelines. One of those victories was Wednesday\u2019s 132-119 quarterfinal victory over the Los Angeles Lakers.<\/p>\n

Reigning Rookie of the Year Stephon Castle produced a season-best 30 points on 10-of-14 shooting and collected 10 rebounds while De\u2019Aaron Fox added 20 points.<\/p>\n

Fox said the Spurs will not be intimidated by Oklahoma City, which has won eight of the past 10 meetings with San Antonio.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat team just won a championship. They\u2019re on a roll right now,\u201d Fox said. \u201cObviously, that\u2019s a tough task. At the end of the day, we go into every game feeling like we can win. We have a group where we feel like we can beat anybody. Crazy things happen. … Anything can happen on any given night.\u201d<\/p>\n

Published on Dec 13, 2025<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Oklahoma City Thunder has matched the best 25-game start in NBA history and will seek out another victory…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":470585,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3783],"tags":[7,6,310,475,179,3966,3965,312,693,68051,62589,68048,68049,68050,19975,37420],"class_list":{"0":"post-470584","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oklahoma-city-thunder","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-oklahoma","11":"tag-oklahoma-city","12":"tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","13":"tag-oklahomacity","14":"tag-oklahomacitythunder","15":"tag-thunder","16":"tag-victor-wembanyama","17":"tag-victor-wembanyama-calf-injury","18":"tag-victor-wembanyama-injury","19":"tag-victor-wembanyama-injury-return","20":"tag-victor-wembanyama-nba-cup","21":"tag-victor-wembanyama-nba-cup-return","22":"tag-victor-wembanyama-san-antonio-spurs","23":"tag-victor-wembanyama-spurs"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115710964847806688","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/470584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=470584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/470584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/470585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=470584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=470584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=470584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}