The San Antonio Spurs open the 2026-27 season Tuesday night by hosting the Oklahoma City Thunder, a rematch of last summer’s epic Western Conference Finals matchup.
San Antonio eliminated the Thunder in seven games to reach the NBA Finals for the first time since 2014 before falling to the New York Knicks.
Both teams return largely intact. The Spurs finished the 2025–26 NBA regular season 62-20; the Thunder went 64-18 and posted the league’s best record for the second straight season.
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On opening night, Spurs head coach Mitch Johnson plans to start a three-guard lineup of De’Aaron Fox, Stephon Castle and Dylan Harper alongside Devin Vassell and Victor Wembanyama.
The lineup puts five of the club’s top players on the floor from the tip against a Thunder group still built around Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren.
Veteran forward Tobias Harris will not make his Spurs debut.
He continues to recover from a left calf strain suffered in training camp.
“He still needs some more progression on the court,” Johnson said. “He’s progressing well. We feel really good about it.”
First-round pick Jayden Quaintance, 19, is also out. The rookie underwent right knee surgery in July and remains in recovery.
The condensed offseason has left the young Spurs navigating a quicker turnaround than they are used to.
“It’s been short, but I just feel like it’s been forever though,” Castle said. “Especially as we’ve been getting closer, doing open gym, training camp, getting through practices, shootarounds, preseason games, you know what’s on the schedule, you know you’re waiting for it.”
“We’re glad it’s finally here.”
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A year ago the Spurs carried internal confidence without publicly declaring themselves Finals contenders. But that confidence has since grown.
“Internally, we thought we were really good,” Castle said. “Obviously, we didn’t know because it was our first real year with that kind of team.”
“You can’t get too ahead of yourself, especially it being this good of a league. But internally, we felt really good about our team and I think we feel probably even better about this year,” Castle said.
Wembanyama, the reigning unanimous Defensive Player of the Year, spoke to the demands of a nine-month season that stretched into June.
“It’s so impressive because I’ve now seen firsthand what it feels like, what it looks like to play until June, to play in the finals, to play nine plus months of NBA basketball intensity,” he said. “I wonder how these guys do it for 10, 15 years. I guess you build up the kind of resistance needed for that over the years, you know, with maturity.”
“It’s maybe the most impressive thing about great NBA players.”
Tip-off is set for 8:30 p.m. local time at Frost Bank Center.
KSAT Sports will air a Spurs season tip-off special starting at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday live from the Frost Bank Center. Catch all the excitement live on KSAT 12, KSAT Plus and KSAT.com.
