The French Connection: Gobert, Wemby put their friendship on hold for the playoffs
ABOUT TWO HOURS after a vicious Victor Wembanyama proper elbow clipped Naz Reid‘s jaw and fully altered the complexion of this second-round collection between the San Antonio Spurs and Minnesota Timberwolvesa reporter requested Rudy Gobert for his perspective.
Did Gobert imagine, the query went, Minnesota’s series-long physicality had annoyed Wembanyama into the flagrant?
“I don’t know,” Gobert smirked. “Ask him.”
There’s maybe no one higher in the world to ship a facsimile of Wembanyama’s viewpoint than Gobert. At a sturdy 7-foot-1, the 13-year professional has lengthy been annoyed about the degree of contact allowed in opposition to him in the paint on account of what he believes is his dimension benefit.
Gobert additionally occurs to have Wembanyama’s ear and admiration. Gobert is one among the biggest French basketball gamers ever and, contemplating their shared place and comparable stature, served as an exemplar for Wembanyama, who seems on observe to develop into the biggest hooper in French historical past.
“He’s played a huge role in my journey,” Wembanyama stated earlier than the collection. “[He] “You have been a job mannequin, you might have impressed me in so many ways in which ought to truly encourage extra individuals.”
But this two-week stretch is the most inconvenient time in history to prod Gobert for some Wembanyama sympathy. The two are midway through a playoff clash that is tied at 2-2 as the series shifts back to San Antonio for Tuesday’s Game 5 (8 p.m. ET, NBC).
Gobert, 33, is trying to break through the playoff ceiling before it’s too late and win his first title, coming off a career-defining performance against Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets. But the 22-year-old he once guided as a teenager is in the way, swatting everything in sight.
Wembanyama is trying to fast-forward his stampede to greatness, obsessed with piling up hardware as rapidly as possible. But his mentor is the lanky roadblock between him and that third-season dream.
Gobert agreed to take ESPN inside his history with Wembanyama the morning of Game 3, pulling back the curtain on their lines of communication. The French big men share almost a decade of friendship, but their text message thread has been quiet for the past week.
“Not proper now,” Gobert said. “[We talk] in common occasions. We say ‘hello’ [on the court]. Our households see one another. But we’re targeted.”
THEY FIRST MET in summer 2017, as Gobert remembers it. He was at a youth tournament in France when Jérémy Medjana, their shared agent, walked in with a 13-year-old who was already creeping past 6-foot tall.
“But, I imply, you see lots of tall children round,” Gobert said. “I truly bear in mind pondering his mother was actually tall.”
Wembanyama’s mother, Elodie, is 6-3. His father, Felix, is 6-7. Over the next few years, from age 13 to 16, Victor blew past both, growing to 7-3.
That’s when video of a 2020 training session in Nanterre, France, surfaced. It included some 2-on-2 work — Gobert and Vincent Poirierthe midprime French basketball legends, facing a pair of rising local teenagers: Wembanyama and Maxime Raynaudwho was drafted by the Sacramento Kings in 2025 and simply completed a promising rookie season beginning at heart for them.
“When I used to be 16, I’d’ve beloved to work out with some NBA gamers,” Gobert said. “Especially the guys that play in my place.”
After the 2-on-2, which included ability flashes from Wembanyama however a stark distinction in power between an grownup and teenager separated by 11 years in age, Gobert took Wembanyama and Raynaud to the weight room. He gave them a glimpse inside the health program that has allowed him to be so sturdy.
“In terms of taking care of your body, he should be a model for all big men,” Wembanyama stated.
Gobert calls Wembanyama a “little bit of a nerd,” which makes them kindred spirits. Gobert stated he grew up taking part in video video games and exploring random hobbies. Wembanyama usually reaches out to choose his mind. They share guide suggestions. They play chess.
But it is clear what Wembanyama takes most from Gobert is the capability to guard and protect a huge physique in a minefield of a career. Gobert has performed no less than 70 video games in eight separate seasons, averaging greater than half-hour in his 905 profession video games.
“It’s everything,” Gobert stated. “You can be as talented as you want, but if you’re not able to be on the floor, what’s the point? You need the discipline to take care of your body. And when you’re 7-feet and higher, you have more pressure on your joints, you’re heavier. There’s a lot more risk. So it requires a lot more invisible work that the average fan doesn’t see.”
Gobert is pleased with a rising basketball legacy that, at occasions, he believes has been disrespected, along with his 4 Defensive Player of the Year awards and the constant work required for them marginalized.
In Wembanyama, he discovered a rising expertise who not solely acknowledged Gobert’s regime however confirmed an amazing degree of curiosity in emulating it. That meant a relentless peppering of questions on diet, health and the secrets and techniques of harm avoidance. Gobert even stated earlier than the collection that Wembanyama just lately texted him to ask what sort of water filters he had in his home.
“It’s all the hours spent getting stronger, getting more flexible,” Gobert stated. “Your recovery, your balance. These are essential to the game that is such a high pace. There’s a lot of contact, a lot of games, a lot of traveling. So if you don’t become, I would say, obsessed with that, you’re not putting the best chances on your side to be out there.”
WEMBANYAMA WAS THE favourite to win Defensive Player of the Year in his second season when it ended prematurely due to deep vein thrombosis in his proper shoulder, a analysis that spooked him and, Gobert felt, elevated his focus.
“Very scary thing,” Gobert stated. “At some point he wasn’t sure if he was going to play basketball again.”
Wembanyama sought out the correct therapy, recovered and exploded in his third season.
ESPN’s Tim MacMahon just lately relayed a narrative of a Spurs assistant coach displaying Wembanyama some Gobert movie in the summer time as a part of a progress plan and Wembanyama retorting again that he was already higher than Gobert defensively.
The assistant reminded Wembanyama that Gobert had 4 DPOYs and the Spurs had simply completed the earlier season twenty fifth in protection, some extent Wembanyama acknowledged as legitimate and obligatory in his quest to show potential into actuality.
This season, as the Spurs rumbled to 62 wins, they completed with the league’s third-best protection, and Wembanyama gained his first DPOY unanimouslysparking dialog about whether or not he’s about to string collectively an unstoppable run in that award class. Gobert believes he will probably be heard from once more.
“As long as I breathe,” Gobert stated, “I’m always going to try to be the best in the world in what I do.”
Gobert and Wembanyama had been teammates throughout the 2024 Olympics. French nationwide workforce coach Vincent Collet used them on the court docket collectively at occasions early in their run however break up them up extra repeatedly as the match progressed, usually retaining Gobert on the bench. He was restricted to 12 minutes in the gold medal loss to the United States.
“For some reason we stopped [going double big],” Gobert stated. “I thought that it was very unique for us to be on the court together and very tough for the other team, but we stopped doing it. “It was advantageous.”
Gobert expressed a level of excitement about pairing up again in the 2028 Olympics and seeking revenge in Los Angeles, believing that could be his last chance at a gold medal.
But, for now, it’s competition between the countrymen in the Western Conference playoffs. Gobert held Jokic to 34-of-82 shooting (41.5%) in the first-round series win over the Nuggets and has held up decently well in isolation against the younger All-Star.
According to ESPN tracking, Gobert has held Wembanyama to 8-of-20 shooting (40%) as the primary defender in this series. Wembanyama has beaten Gobert using the drive, but Gobert has found plenty of success when he’s able to keep Wembanyama away from the basket as a jump shooter.
That will again be a key battleground in a pivotal Game 5 on Tuesday night, when the Timberwolves expect a motivated Wembanyama to return to the series aggressively, attempting to dominate a center he once idolized.
“I hope that the French persons are proud,” Gobert said. “France, we have now very distinctive kind of followers. Numerous occasions, typically there’s this factor the place they’re more durable on the French individuals than on others and so they moderately be followers of others.
“What I truly care about is for the young kids in France that they have people to look up to and can see what is possible.”