IT’S AN OVERCAST MONDAY at Harlandale Excessive on the south facet of San Antonio, and the campus is abuzz in anticipation of the sixtieth Frontier Bowl, set for kickoff on the finish of the week between the Indians and rival Cowboys of McCollum.
In football-obsessed Texas, cowbells, tailgating and the odor of burgers scorching over scorching coals sometimes dominate excessive colleges in October. So when Harlandale’s boys’ and ladies’ varsity basketball groups sat in an empty auditorium ready for a shock customer, no one knew what to anticipate.
“What up guys?” San Antonio Spurs ahead Devin Vassell mentioned, rising from backstage.
“How y’all doing?”
The room immediately erupted into applause. Lastly, Harlandale’s basketball groups felt seen.
In some methods, Vassell mentioned he can relate to that anonymity. The longest-tenured starter on the Spurs, Vassell normally is not talked about in conversations in regards to the workforce’s vaunted beginning lineup, which additionally options De’Aaron Fox, Stephon Fort, Dylan Harper and phenom Victor Wembanyama.
Vassell has been a three-and-D participant, a near-20-point-per-game scorer, and a major creator and shotmaker. He has performed small ahead and capturing guard for the Spurs. Now, Vassell mans the ability ahead place. When he signed a five-year, $145 million extension in 2023, Vassell turned the highest-paid participant in franchise historical past (he has since been surpassed).
But exterior of San Antonio, Vassell looks as if an afterthought among the many names populating a star-studded beginning lineup with two All-Stars in Wembanyama and Fox and a pair of guards in Fort and Harper destined for loads of All-Star nods sooner or later.
“I really feel like that is form of been my complete life,” Vassell instructed ESPN. “I wasn’t a five-star [recruit], wasn’t one of many large names. So, I’ve labored my means for all the pieces, and I’ve by no means actually cared about what anyone else has to say. I do not fear in regards to the headlines. I do not fear about factors. It is only a matter of how I can affect the workforce. It has been in many alternative methods. And I believe that helped me a lot for the place I am at as we speak.”
Coming off of its first NBA Finals look since 2014, San Antonio signed veteran energy ahead Tobias Harris in free company. Harris has began in 913 of his 1,033 profession video games over greater than a decade. The membership additionally needed so as to add Harper to the beginning lineup alongside its different dynamic guards.
Vassell appeared more likely to be relegated to a task off the bench this season, nevertheless it was by no means below severe consideration, even through the workforce’s free company discussions with Harris. Spurs coach Mitch Johnson considers Vassell to be the “most constant particular person on the roster.” It is a designation earned from the plethora of roles mastered over the course of a profession in San Antonio that heads into Yr 7. And his most essential function occurs off the courtroom.
“I believe that is a good assertion,” Johnson instructed ESPN. “I additionally suppose we considered all the pieces. However I do not know the way lengthy we gave that one a thought. I am not saying he is the perfect. I am not saying it is simply on the courtroom. I simply suppose he is reached this degree of consistency, whether or not it is being snug in his personal pores and skin, being comfy with who he’s as an individual, as a participant. I really feel he is reached his prime, which is usually a little little bit of a lightning-rod phrase, I do know. Nevertheless it simply seems like he is so reliable in each single means, no matter manufacturing or end result.”
JOHNSON SERVED AS Vassell’s player-development coach when the ahead arrived in San Antonio in 2020 because the No. 11 decide. The Spurs have been coming into the second yr of a six-year playoff drought that ended with final season’s Finals run, and Johnson had simply been promoted to Gregg Popovich’s bench because the substitute for Corridor of Famer Tim Duncan, who spent just one season because the longtime coach’s assistant.
Johnson dealt with Vassell’s growth and movie research, offering the ahead with sincere suggestions that was by no means sugarcoated whereas praising him for the strides he was making. Johnson’s relationship with Vassell and the remainder of the gamers who had beforehand performed for Popovich helped him earn the workforce’s belief.
Johnson known as Vassell’s evolution “actually enjoyable to see and be part of,” throwing up air quotes when describing him as a capturing guard and wing earlier in his profession that morphed right into a participant able to guarding frontcourt opponents.
Vassell and his rebounding capacity are key to creating San Antonio’s smaller guard-heavy beginning lineup work. It is value noting that lineup was on the courtroom when OG Anunoby tipped within the profitable basket in Recreation 4 within the NBA Finals in June, making rebounding this season a precedence.
“[Rebounding] is a big factor [in the new starting lineup],” Johnson mentioned. “Devin’s progress in that could be a enormous factor that could be a enormous a part of that concept, [and] the group working. The concept of them and him being a giant a part of the rebounding has to occur, or it will not work.”
Johnson watched Vassell compete in beginning lineups over time alongside gamers reminiscent of Keldon Johnson, the longest-tenured Spur, in addition to Dejounte Murray, Tre Jones, Jakob Poeltl, Doug McDermott, Jeremy Sochan and Zach Collins. Corridor of Fame coach Popovich was nonetheless on the helm when Vassell turned the highest-paid participant in franchise historical past, simply as Wembanyama began his rookie season.
“My function, you recognize, it is modified rather a lot over time,” Vassell mentioned. “My first yr, being a three-and-D participant, just like Carter [Bryant’s] place, DNP generally, barely enjoying. If I made a mistake, I used to be out of the sport. My second and third yr I used to be form of simply rising into an NBA participant, beginning to get in that beginning function. Then, as soon as Dejounte and all of them have been traded, it was me and KJ (Keldon Johnson). We have been each making an attempt to get 20, making an attempt to win video games. Clearly, it wasn’t sufficient.”
However because the years handed, the Spurs upgraded the expertise, beginning with a generational famous person in Wembanyama, adopted by the additions of Fort, Fox and Harper. Now a veteran chief on the workforce, Vassell laughs when he tells youthful teammates tales about how good they’ve now bought it with Johnson working the present.
“Despite the fact that Pop isn’t round as a lot as he was, he is all the time in my ear,” Vassell mentioned. “He is all the time speaking to me. And I inform Dylan [Harper] and Carter [Bryant] on a regular basis, ‘Look, y’all bought Mitch. He is a bit bit completely different.’ However Pop, he was all the time simply on me, and he noticed one thing in me that perhaps I did not even see in myself but. That has actually helped me out to this present day.”
WEMBANYAMA HAD JUST dropped a season-high 43 factors in a win over Minnesota as he looked for Vassell within the locker room. Vassell is a sought-after mentor on the workforce’s facility and throughout the locker room at Frost Financial institution Heart, usually telling youthful gamers reminiscent of Harper and Bryant, “I used to be as soon as in your footwear.”
4 nights earlier, Vassell handed for a team-high eight assists in an Oct. 27 victory towards Sacramento. Afterward, he quietly endorsed Bryant in entrance of their adjoining lockers after they completed dressing. Fox — one stall over subsequent to Carter on the left — was standing inside earshot listening to the dialog about overcoming the urge to overthink conditions on the courtroom.
Bryant mentioned he needed to “continue learning from him so long as he is keen to show me.” The second-year ahead added that he receives a mixture of robust love and encouragement from Vassell, whether or not that is off the courtroom “simply chilling,” on the courtroom in video games and practices, or on workforce flights.
“Devin’s improve in management, it coincides with our improve as a contender,” Wembanyama mentioned. “He embodies our progress.”
Vassell’s maturity was on show because the Spurs notched their third win of the season in an time beyond regulation victory over the Jazz.
Vassell shot simply 2-of-9 over the primary three quarters that evening however poured in 17 of his 21 factors within the second half, connecting on 4 of 5 photographs within the fourth quarter. Then, in time beyond regulation, Vassell hit a 10-footer earlier than logging a two-handed putback jam with 1:53 left after Josh Inexperienced blocked a Harper layup.
“He was [2]-for-9 going into the fourth quarter,” Johnson mentioned. “However he was enjoying the sport appropriately. Subsequent factor you recognize, he form of helped stroll the sport down. On the floor degree, it is like, ‘Oh, he will play off Victor, Fox, Steph and Dylan.’ Subsequent factor you recognize, we’re working motion for him to shut the sport. You need to have psychological toughness to trip … of this ‘function’ that you simply’re enjoying on the given time.”
San Antonio launched into a 12-0 run to place away the sport. Vassell scored 12 factors within the fourth quarter and time beyond regulation.
“His years of being right here give him this sense of being certain of what he does,” Wembanyama mentioned. “He’s certain of what he does, however we’re additionally certain. We have got full belief in him. We just like the ball to seek out him in these moments.”
Maybe extra importantly, Vassell personifies the selflessness wanted for this younger San Antonio squad to ascend to the subsequent degree. The 26-year-old averaged 13.9 factors, 4.0 rebounds and a couple of.5 assists through the common season in 2025-26. In 23 playoff outings, he averaged 13.0 factors, 5.3 rebounds and a couple of.7 assists whereas drawing the accountability of guarding Karl-Anthony Cities within the Finals.
“Dev turned most likely my favourite participant within the NBA after final yr,” Bryant mentioned. “I hit him after the season. I used to be like, ‘I’ve a lot respect for you.’ If Dev was on another workforce within the NBA, he’d be a 20-to-25 factors an evening man. Simply. He is so expert, so proficient. The sacrifices he took for us to make that subsequent step as a workforce [have] been wonderful.”
The veteran showcased that very same selflessness and mentorship within the auditorium at Harlandale Excessive in October. Seconds after he addressed the basketball groups, Vassell’s mom, Cynthia, yanked a maroon flag from a protracted desk to disclose stacks of orange and scorching pink Nike packing containers. Vassell had gifted the boys’ workforce pairs of Devin Booker’s signature shoe, the Ebook 2, in silver and black to begin its basketball season. The women acquired pairs of A’ja Wilson’s A’Two shoe.
Vassell additionally introduced a $10,000 verify.
Quickly after, he would depart by way of the courtyard at Harlandale towards a Lamborghini truck wrapped in a color-shifting movie he described as “simply is determined by what your eye can see,” with college students scurrying from round buildings with telephones in hand itching to snap a photograph of a bona fide NBA participant.
To the scholars, Vassell wasn’t simply the “different” Spurs starter.
However that does not imply he is uncomfortable stepping again into anonymity for San Antonio to safe the final word prize that eluded the membership in final season’s Finals.
“Individuals all the time ask me, ‘What do you need to common?'” he mentioned. “It is laborious to say when you’ve got so many nice gamers in your workforce. There’s most likely 4 or 5 of us [who could average 20 points]. However that is not what we want. We simply want any individual who is available in daily and helps the workforce out nevertheless it wants. That is what I have been.”
