Chet Holmgren Opens Up About His Rivalry with Victor Wembanyama

Chad appreciate you coming on man than for me you've had some highlights over the years one of my favorites is you I think 17 years old you're playing against Steph Curry and you kind of put some moves on him what was your mentality going to this game were you nervous at all uh no I wouldn't say nervous uh I was just kind of hooping um you know I always like to come out the same way be aggressive and uh just kind of do what I've been working on so there's some players that talk about like their first time they step on the court against a player they maybe watched they're like oh a little intimidated maybe a little anxious anything or you always just been super confident I'd say anxious is the right word like kind of just like ready

like you know let's do it tired of the waiting around but I wouldn't say nervous you know I know what I can do what I can't do I'm going to go out there and try and do what I can do so do you think people underrate your handles and you're very Shifty as well um because of your size like do you think that's an underrated part of your game no I feel like people put a lot of emphasis on it um n I'd say evenly rated okay perfectly rated one of my favorite uh NBA shots this year is you sending the game to overtime against the Warriors has to find somebody finds the turn around shot to tie it's hogen with the three at the buzzer was the play drawn up for you uh there were a couple of different

options on the play but that was like the last option it's like nothing else is open like get it here and then obviously there was like second and a half or something on the clock so it's like if I get the ball I got to shoot it so and we run over it in situations and practice and everything yeah um but usually I turn in practice I turn the other way uh-huh I don't know why I turned that way so it just happened that way so you have like a second there's 1.7 seconds left you have to not step out of bounds and then you have to jump over Wiggins and make sure to hit the shot you what's the number one thing you're keeping in mind as you are shooting that shot or you know you're

about to get that shot I mean you're not really keeping anything in your mind yeah because once you start thinking that slows you down then you overthink so it's just like I practice it I'm going just go do it like I've practiced it before you know so just kind of free flowing at that point you're off the backboard dunk at what point did you know you were going to throw it off the backboard uh when I saw him jump mhm pump fake big part of my game big part of a lot of people's game it's effective uh what Shay does is he'll get you in the air and then he'll draw the foul and gets the free throw line yeah you know still involving I got to add that to my game a little bit um but you know I got

this one in there so uh this one's pretty effective too it is the off the backboard dunk something you practice or was it kind of an instincts thing in that moment uh I feel like everybody who can dunk has kind of done it just like dinking around yeah U maybe like playing one-onone or somebody but never like I have done it in like pickup and stuff before too uh but like it's not something where it's like this is a part of my game I do this every night you know like it's kind of just happened I guess the next one is your game against wemi when the game was played people have always kind of said it's like the two best young big men in the NBA right now um what was kind of your mentality as you're playing this game because it was a great win

for you guys won by 2025 um just try to go out there with an understanding that you know obviously there's a big narrative around the game because of the matchup and everything but also understanding that it's still the Thunder versus Spurs and we got to win a basketball game so just going out there and trying to compete uh at as high of a level as I can um but you know also try and you know leave my fingerprints on the game yeah what's something with a Defender like him he's so tall people talk about all the time that you're trying to keep in mind um to kind of disrupt his offensive flow but then also when he's guarding you how to get that shot off uh just understanding how tall he is yeah you know it's like it's not too many times

I'm playing against somebody taller than me so right um just understanding that and uh you know trying to counter that I guess totally and last question for me is when you see the growth in yourself from the beginning of this year to the end what do you think is the biggest Improvement you've made um I wouldn't say it's one area like I've game to game I've improved on a lot of different things um from defensive rotations to when to take certain shots um you know where I'm going to find different shots different spots all that like it's a lot of little things um you know in the offseason is really when you improve at you know I want to get really good at shooting fadeaways over my right shoulder that's

more of an offseason thing so in season just trying to figure things out um that are kind of like small little things in the game and when you're blocking a shot like on this one where you it kind of hits off the backboard how do you work on the timing of that CU that's something that people struggle with at times was it a natural thing for you or is it just something that you practice over time and it kind of worked out I feel like it's a little bit of both uh just having good time and then also having good awareness you know when you play enough basketball uh you start to see different situations yeah over and then it's to point where you can kind of see them before they happen and then uh you know kind of

react to something that hasn't even happened yet knowing what's going to happen so Chad thank you so much for the time man I appreciate it we do this again soon yep