SAN ANTONIO — Victor Wembanyama missed the final shot of the 2026 NBA Finals, untucked his jersey, and marched his thin, 7-foot-4 frame straight toward the San Antonio Spurs’ locker room in defeat.No congratulatory handshakes for the New York Knicks, who took Game 5, 94-90, and the finals, 4-1. No soaking in the scene, remembering the hurt as the Knicks celebrated. Just off toward the tunnel, to his locker, to the podium, and then to the offseason.“It’s painful. But I’m not running away from that,” said Wembanyama, who scored 19 points with 14 rebounds while shooting 7 of 19 from the field. “I’m using it to fuel me.”Wembanyama, 22, is a French superstar and NBA Defensive Player of the Year in just his third season. He averaged 26 points, 11.2 rebounds and 3.6 blocks in the finals. The Spurs led by double digits in every game of this series, but blew those leads in four of them, and Wembanyama made some critical mistakes in three of the losses.In Game 5, Wembanyama shot just 1 of 5 in the fourth quarter. The game was, for all intents and purposes, over when he missed that final 3-pointer — it would’ve taken a miracle to win, and the miracles in this series were on the other side.But Wembanyama still didn’t stop to shake hands with any Knicks players, the way LeBron James shook Stephen Curry’s hand at the end of the 2015 finals, or the way most players do when they are on the losing end of any series. If the victors aren’t busy congratulating each other, of course.Brunson actually shook Spurs coach Mitch Johnson’s hand before he started celebrating with teammates, but it was not immediately clear if Wembanyama congratulated any Knicks players after the court had cleared. No reporters asked him directly why he didn’t shake any of the Knicks’ hands immediately after the game.Then again, New York wasn’t kind to Wembanyama. Fans jeered him with derogatory taunts at Madison Square Garden, and someone threw an egg at him at the team hotel after Game 4.He also was chippy with the Knicks. In Game 3, he escaped a flagrant foul when he threw Brunson down from behind and grabbed Brunson’s neck to do it. He also appeared to be in Brunson’s landing zone on a missed 3 in Game 5. Brunson landed on Wembanyama’s ankle and went down, and Wemby could’ve been called for a Flagrant for that, too.Had Wembanyama been assessed a flagrant and the Spurs won Game 5, he would have faced the possibility of a suspension for Game 6.So, yes, Wembanyama’s first finals experience was tough and emotional. The ending was not a happy one.“What I’m pissed about is that there’s probably a hundred games before we can be back in finals,” Wembanyama said. “I don’t know how to say it in English, but I’m going to have to hold that inside of me and slow down and wait and execute for a hundred games.”Wembanyama finished second in MVP voting and was named MVP of the Western Conference finals in which the Spurs took Games 6 and 7 from 2025 champion Oklahoma City. The Spurs only won one finals game, but were outscored by just 12 points across the series.Wembanyama appeared fatigued over the final two games. He was 3 of 14 in the fourth quarters of Games 4 and 5, and the Spurs blew combined leads of 25 points in those quarters.“The margin of error is very thin,” Wembanyama said. “Our domination stints are absolute. We absolutely dominated for most of the series. But our errors, our mistakes, are punished so hard that we can’t have ups and downs like this. So much, you know.“The ups are okay. The downs is the reason we lost.”Jun 14, 2026Connections: Sports EditionSpot the pattern. Connect the termsFind the hidden link between sports terms