Clippers' James Harden gets real on "beast" Victor Wembanyama
12/31/2024 11:06 PM
The Los Angeles Clippers took on the San Antonio Spurs on New Year’s Eve. It’s the second time James Harden’s club will take on Victor Wembanyama, who continues to dominate the league in just his second season.
Ahead of the matchup, Harden had some glowing remarks to make about the Spurs’ star.
Clippers’ James Harden speaks on Spurs’ star Victor Wembanyama
After a spectacular rookie season in which he averaged 21.4 points, 10.6 rebounds, 3.9 assists, 1.2 steals, and 3.6 blocks per game, Victor Wembanyama has taken a major jump.
This season, Wembanyama is averaging 25.5 points, 10.0 rebounds, 3.8 assists, 1.0 steal, and 4.0 blocks per game while shooting 47.8 percent from the field and 35.9 percent from three.
Wembanyama shot 46.5 percent from the field and 32.5 percent from three last season while taking 5.5 threes per game. This season, Wembanyama’s volume has skyrocketed, taking 19.1 field goal attempts per game and a whopping 9.5 threes per game.
"Beast,” James Harden said when asked about Wemby. “A beast. On both ends. His confidence… His shot looks way more confident, he’s shooting it with confidence. Defensively, he’s active, blocking shots. He’s doing it all.”
After starting out the season averaging just 17.7 points on 41.3 percent shooting from the field and 22.6 percent from three across his first nine games, Victor Wembanyama has flipped a major switch.
Since November 9th, Wembanyama is averaging 29.4 points on 50.1 percent shooting from the field, 40.2 percent from three, and 86.7 percent from the free throw line.
“Guys like [myself, LeBron James, Stephen Curry] are leaving and guys like Wemby are coming in,” Harden added. “It’s like, we thought we’ve never seen certain players before and then Wemby come in like, come on, what are we doing. Which is something special.”
James Harden on Victor Wembanyama:
"Beast. Beast. On both ends. And his shot looks way more confident, he's shooting it with confidence. Defensively, he's active, blocking shots. He's doing it all. Guys like us are leaving and guys like Wemby are coming in. We thought we've… pic.twitter.com/H1qZKaKhdD
— Tomer Azarly (@TomerAzarly) December 28, 2024
Clippers forward Nicolas Batum had long been warning folks stateside about an extremely tall and lanky center from France. Now in his second season in the NBA and fresh off a silver medial in the 2024 Paris Olympics, Batum has spoken about how proud he is of Wembanyama, who played for his and Tony Parker’s team in France before the NBA.
"I mean he’s good to have a guy who come from your country be like that phenom,” Batum said. “So it's going to be the next 15-plus years is going to be insane for him. So just glad I got to know him way before that and to play against him for a little bit is great because I know in a couple years he might be insane to guard or just to watch him play is going to be insane. So if everything stay on line, injuries and everything, he can be great. So no just happy for him. Proud as a French. As a fan, pretty happy for him.”
The Clippers will take on the Spurs another two times this season after splitting their first two meetings, on January 29th in San Antonio and April 8th in Inglewood.
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