Matthew “Moose” Lopez
Sports Editor
Being born in San Antonio means you inherently hold three things close to your heart: Your favorite breakfast tacos, what side of town you’re from and the San Antonio Spurs.
The Spurs have been a pillar in the community since before I could even formulate a sentence. San Antonio is a basketball city. Babies are given basketballs with their birth details at hospitals. Images of Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili and Gregg Popovich pepper the outsides of buildings and the insides of bars and restaurants, serving as shining symbols of consistent excellence fortified by a passion to win as a group, ever as an individual.
I couldn’t tell you where it all started. I wasn’t born when David Robinson or Duncan got drafted. When I was barely three years old, the Spurs were on championship number two of their five ring dynasty. By the time I was graduating Middle School, the Spurs had taken down the infamous Lebron James led Miami Heat after losing to them in seven games the year before. The city-wide party that erupted in 2014 was an experience I’ll never forget. The streets were flooded with honking cars, cheering fans and smiling faces. When the Spurs are successful, the city has a buzz to it, as if the trials and tribulations of life melt away once tip-off happens. The Spurs are the only prominent professional sports team (save for the rising star of the Missions) in San Antonio, so rooting for the home team feels all the more gratifying when your whole city unifies for it.
However, the last few years would see the Spurs fall out of relevance. The team has missed the playoffs the past six years and the franchise cornerstone players had all left or retired. The Spurs teams that people grew up with and the names the community had ingrained in their psyche were gone. The quiet dominance of the silver and black soon faded into the history of the NBA. The city stopped caring as much and who could blame them, winning wasn’t a luxury but an expectation. To be honest there wasn’t much to cheer for anyways, for a while they were one of the worst teams in the league. I have to admit that Spurs fans are spoiled. We’ve known nothing but victory for the better part of two decades.
Now the Spurs are back in the NBA Finals, a familiar place for the organization and the city, but the faces that got them there are as green as they come. San Antonio has fully backed this new young squad with the ferocity and passion of my formative years. This wasn’t an overnight change, this was built up all season. This team of young talented players had to prove to the city that they were worth its unwavering support and they did so ten-fold. Going into the season, the average fan had reasonable expectations of simply making it to the playoffs. It was a very realistic goal given how much talent the roster had. Soon, Spurs fans and the entire NBA would realize that these young hoopers were capable of so much more. This team is unquestionably ahead of schedule. They soon rose from an exciting up-and-coming team to title contenders in a matter of months. For the first time in my adult life, the Spurs are good and that sentiment applies to a lot of the population in San Antonio. I think that’s what makes this run all the more special for the community as a whole. For the older generation, they are seeing a return to form while the younger fans are witnessing the beginning of a potential dynasty; both have been starved to see a winning Spurs season. The excitement and buzz the city once had in my childhood has returned and now you can’t go anywhere without someone talking about the team or talking about the game from the other night. People I’ve known for years and have never once mentioned basketball in a sentence are bringing up which referees will be officiating the Spurs games. It’s not just in San Antonio though, the silver and black fandom reaches all the way here in Medina County. I see trucks with huge Spurs flags waving behind coming down East Hondo Avenue here in Devine. People from Natalia brandishing spurs shirts on game days. Lytle hosting huge watch parties at various establishments. They’re not even from San Antonio but the excitement for the team is as passionate as anyone from the 210.
Sports are funny because it’s such a physical and tactile thing, but the concepts and emotions surrounding it are so abstract. I can’t tell you why I cried when the Spurs beat the Oklahoma City Thunder to advance to the finals. I can’t explain why families come together to watch the games. I can’t describe why complete strangers are embracing in the streets after every Spurs win. The only rationale I can come up with is that it makes people happy and sometimes that’s the only explanation needed. At the time of press, the Spurs just took a big win in game three over New York at Madison Square Garden. San Antonio is trailing the Knicks 1-2 in the series, but no matter how this series plays out, I’ll be tuned into every game. The roller coaster of emotions that comes with supporting your team is what makes sports so special.
The San Antonio Spurs: The reason I exist
