Victor Wembanyama dazzles with 30-point night in homecoming game

PARIS — The first huge roar from the crowd came before the match even started. All Victor Wembanyama had to do to send the fans in Paris into a full-blown frenzy, it turned out, was to say hello into a microphone.

The cheering right from that lasted about 30 seconds.

Welcome home, Wemby. For the first time as an NBA player, Wembanyama played in his home country Thursday — the star attraction in this two-game set of games between San Antonio and Indiana, a series that ends Saturday night.

And it did not disappoint. Neither did Wembanyama. He had an incredible game — 30 points, 11 rebounds, six assists, five blocked shots — and the Spurs rolled to a 140-110 victory, San Antonio’s second-largest margin of victory of the season and Indiana’s second-largest margin of defeat.

Countless fans turned up in Wembanyama jerseys. All his jerseys, that is. Spurs jerseys in at least three different colors. French national team jerseys. He wore the jerseys when he played in the French league. NBA games are a big deal wherever they go in the world, but this was different. This was a homecoming.

“I just want to say it’s a pleasure to be part of a league with Victor Wembanyama,” NBA commissioner Adam Silver said before the game.

Wembanyama received – by far – the loudest ovation when the starters were introduced. When his face was shown on the scoreboard video screens during the playing of France’s national anthem, the building simply roared. He won the opening tap to start the game; another roar. He missed the first shot of the game and let out an audible groan. There weren’t many of them the rest of the way.

“It’s not easy to stop him,” Indiana guard Bennedict Mathurin said. “We do what we can. But he’s really good.”

This wasn’t Spurs-Pacers. This was Wemby and a bunch of other guys. And if there was pressure, Wembanyama — the league’s reigning rookie of the year and a likely All-Star this season — didn’t seem fazed.

“The standing ovation for him was obviously very, very moving, just in terms of a reflection of how this city and country and these people feel about him and he feels about them,” Spurs acting coach Mitch Johnson said. “There are certain games you know you don’t have to get the guys up to like you say. This was one of them.”

Poor Boomer. He is the Pacers mascot. He’s a blue, furry thing. Part of his in-game duties include wearing oversized mitts on his hands and encouraging fans to clap for some defense. This usually works wonders for Pacers home games, which this matchup technically was, at least on paper.

Boomer was fended off repeatedly Thursday. Cheering with him, you see, meant fans would have cheered against Wembanyama’s Spurs. It’s not going to happen. Not in Paris.

Technically, it may have happened once. Wembanyama had a spectacular block late in the third quarter, and had it counted, it would have been his fourth in as many possessions. The crowd obviously didn’t see that referee Zach Zarba was gesturing for goaltenders, so the basket did the talking – and it was the only Pacers basket that the French crowd cheered.

“I thought it was a great environment,” Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said. “I don’t know what Victor said before the game, but whatever he said worked. They played a great game. Victor is a great player. The country of France should be very, very proud. He’s a one-of-a-kind. He’s a once-in-a-lifetime every I-don’t-know-how-many-generations a player like that comes along, just breathtaking, the things he does.”