SAN ANTONIO — The San Antonio Spurs won on the road against the New Orleans Pelicans, 111-106. The Spurs snap a seven-game losing skid versus the Pelicans.
Victor Wembanyama scored 17 points and 11 rebounds, and Julian Champagnie scored 15 points in the win. Zach Collins contributed 15 points, Malaki Branham scored 14 points, and Devonte Graham posted 20.
Due to injuries, San Antonio was without Jeremy Sochan, Keldon Johnson, Cedi Osman, and Devin Vassell.
The Spurs are 19-58 on the season and will next host the Philadelphia 76ers on Sunday night.
Here's a sample of what the teams said after the game.
SPURS
Coach Gregg Popovich:
“A lot of guys stepped up and played well. Physicality picked up in the second half, and just the contributions from a lot of guys that haven’t been played a lot. Devonte' (Graham) was superb. Sandro (Mamukelashvili) was superb coming off the bench. Jules (Julian Champagnie) has been playing, but he had a great game. But, overall it took a good number of people to keep up the energy. We started out slowly in the first half, so we came around and physically played better.”
Graham:
“I know all the staff here in the arena and all the coaches, all the teammates. The city had shown a lot of love when I was here and I still got a home here, so it’s kind of like my third home.”
Wembanyama:
“Throughout the year, of course, we have had to adapt to this, but I think the coaches and also my teammates have worked to try and get me involved even though they play defense like this. So, yeah, it comes back— attracting defense and getting double-teamed isn’t necessarily a bad thing if we can pass the ball as a team, so we got plenty of options. The game of basketball is full of resources.”
PELICANS
Coach Willie Green:
“Not our best execution. But that’s an area of growth. But, look, we had one down the stretch where we had the block and we talk about that – where (Victor) Wembanyama is down there when you drive, you got to be looking to kick out. The late one we just fumbled the ball.”
CJ McCollum:
"I have to guard better, everybody’s got to guard better and give ourselves a chance to win some of these games. If we get stops it makes the games easier, and we didn’t get enough stops to execute down the stretch tonight."