SAN ANTONIO — Things just got real for the San Antonio Spurs. A wake-up call was going to come eventually. It was inevitable. Not one of those Victor-Wembanyama-is-out-and-he’s-not-always-a-given kind of things. No. This was a Wembanyama-can’t-always-save-them game.

Wembanyama’s NBA playoff record 12 blocks weren’t enough in Monday’s Game 1 of the Western Conference semifinals. The Minnesota Timberwolves eventually realized trying to shoot over him every possession wouldn’t work, even if Terrence Shannon Jr. told Wembanyama he would keep going at him. So they found ways to push him where they wanted him and keep him from where they didn’t.

The Spurs were so close, the margin coming down to Julian Champagnie missing a wide-open 3 at the buzzer. They lost 104-102 to a team that’s done this before, with a roster full of lengthy and nasty defenders who have made a living taking down the best players in the game. Minnesota has an identity that was forged in the fire of deep playoff runs.

Winning a first-round series usually entails the higher seed’s talent advantage blanketing everything. That doesn’t really happen at this stage, at least in today’s West.

The difference between the Spurs and Wolves this season was consistency over stretches of months. But playoff series go down in a relative instant, just a week or two of a pair of teams ramming at each other. Their best has to show up now, and the Wolves don’t have any question about their identity. All their key guys have plenty of postseason experience. Most of the Spurs are just getting their feet wet, and it showed in Game 1.

“It just went by like this, and that’s not good,” Wembanyama said. “It means I didn’t have the grasp on the game that I wish I did.”

The Wolves are built different. They’re longer, stronger, fiercer. The game plan is so much more complex against them, and it took the Spurs out of their comfort zone in the half court. The entirety of the Wolves’ defense conspired to keep Wembanyama from getting downhill by sending early help to the free-throw line. Julius Randle turned into a lead blocker on offense to move him out of the way in crunch time.

Minnesota had so many ideas, and a lot of them worked, giving it just enough of an edge to hold on. The Spurs were right there in the end, as coach Mitch Johnson’s gamble to not call a timeout on the final play paid off and the team’s best shooter, Champagnie, got a dream look that clanked off the rim. The Spurs did the things they’re supposed to do in the final minute: Wemby attacked the rim, Champagnie crashed the glass, Dylan Harper got a game-saving steal. They just didn’t have the same level of control of the game as things sped up in the late fourth quarter.

This was the first time all season Wembanyama crossed the 40-minute threshold (he had two games in the 39-minute range that rounded up), and he acknowledged that managing his energy was a factor in his offensive struggles after missing all eight of his attempts from deep. It wasn’t just that he lost some momentum at times, but that he channeled his efforts in less efficient directions.

“I feel like I have to use my energy,” Wembanyama said. “Obviously, I used a lot of it on one side of the court, and on the other side, offensively, I used too much energy on things that didn’t really help our team. So that’s on me. But first thing, I got to start making some shots.”

Wembanyama began to list the Spurs’ various problems, from his game just not feeling good to the offensive leaders of the team needing to be better.

“So basically, if everything was different, it would have been different,” Wembanyama said.

He said the loss was on him. Then De’Aaron Fox came out and said the same thing about himself. He was matter-of-fact about it, like it was obvious.

“It was me,” Fox said. “Unforced turnovers, missed shots, it wasn’t really anything that they did. They’re a good defensive team. But I think this game in particular, it was on me.”

Fox, who went 5 of 14 and 0 of 4 from 3, knows the Spurs won’t advance without him finding his touch. He started slowly in the first round against the Portland Trail Blazers, then took over as the Spurs inched closer to advancing. He’ll need to do the same thing the rest of the way against the Wolves.

Though he has been one of the team’s main vets — Harper shouted out “Unc” while Fox was speaking postgame — this is also uncharted territory for him. Last week was his first playoff series win, as well. All of the players the Spurs rely on to create their offense haven’t done it in May, which is the toughest thing to learn in the game.

Anthony Edwards has proven he can do it. When he was asked to compare how he feels now to when he was in the same position as the Spurs’ young players, making their playoff debuts and trying to find themselves against a physical opponent, he prudently sidestepped the question like he was gonna pull up for 3.

“I feel like that question is giving them the answer,” Edwards said. “It’s kind of a weird question because if I answer it, they’re gonna watch it and be like, ‘Oh, we need to do this.’ So I can’t really answer it.”

He’s right. What little edge the Wolves now hold could be gone in a moment, and every advantage is crucial in the playoffs. There are not many talent gaps anymore. Everyone has roughly the same amount. The difference comes down to execution, toughness and luck.

Wembanyama was asked if there was a silver lining in the loss, knowing just how close his team was. The idiom didn’t translate naturally for him, which was for the best.

“I don’t know what a silver lining means, but obviously, we have to be better,” Wembanyama said. “It shows up on the stat sheet, but we need to figure out before 48 hours what we can do better, and I got no doubt that we will. I trust us.”