Spurs present Victor Wembanyama with Rookie of the Year trophy at San Antonio College planetarium

SAN ANTONIO (AP) — The San Antonio Spurs presented Victor Wembanyama with the NBA Rookie of the Year trophy on Saturday at the planetarium on the campus of San Antonio College — an appropriate venue, perhaps, for a player nicknamed “The Alien.”

The 7-foot-3 center from France was a unanimous selection, the sixth player in league history to receive every first-place vote for an award that's been handed out since 1953. He joined Houston’s Ralph Sampson (1984), the Spurs' David Robinson (1990), the Los Angeles Clippers’ Blake Griffin (2011), Portland’s Damian Lillard (2013) and Minnesota’s Karl-Anthony Towns (2016).

He is the third San Antonio player to win the award, following Robinson and Tim Duncan (1998).

The Spurs finished 22-60 this season, matching their record in 2022-23, but there is plenty of optimism for the future after Wembanyama lived up to his potential as the No. 1 overall pick in the draft.

“Of course, I want to win as soon as possible, and I want the team results to be there, but I didn’t expect to be champions in my first year,” Wembanyama said. “This is one of the representations of our progression throughout the year and the efforts we all made on the court.”

Wembanyama became the only rookie in league history to average at least 21.4 points, 10.6 rebounds, 3.9 assists, 3.6 blocks and 1.2 steals per game.

“You’ve represented the Spurs, you’ve represented yourself, you’ve represented France, everybody,” Robinson said in a tribute video. “Great job. I couldn’t be more proud of you.”

After tying a league record with 22 straight postseason appearances from 1998 to 2019 under Robinson and Duncan, San Antonio has missed the playoffs in five straight seasons. But Wembanyama feels fortunate to play for a franchise that has won five NBA titles and has one of the league's most respected coaches in Gregg Popovich.

“What I know is that there is a difference between us, the Spurs, the way we play and 90 percent of the teams in the league,” Wembanyama said. “I feel like we involve all players on the court. We have this will to share the ball and I can see that the coaches have this will to keep developing that and not become an iso-ball team, for example. I’m glad this is something that the Spurs have done for years.”

After receiving the award, Wembanyama stuck around with a group of children to watch a presentation on dark matter.

“I like these kinds of questions,” Wembanyama said. “Dark matter is a mass we can’t see, but we know it’s there because it’s got influence on gravitational pulls and the speed of gravitational orbits in every galaxy. Its presence inside galaxies is five times higher than regular seeable matter, so it’s a huge mystery. We can’t see it. We can’t observe it, but we can observe its influence. This is dark matter. Very sci-fi.”

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San Antonio Spurs' Victor Wembanyama 2023-24 NBA Rookie of the Year trophy sits on table during an NBA basketball press conference, Saturday, May 11, 2024, in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Darren Abate)

San Antonio Spurs' Victor Wembanyama speaks after receiving his 2023-24 NBA Rookie of the Year trophy during an NBA basketball news conference, Saturday, May 11, 2024, in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Darren Abate)

San Antonio Spurs' Victor Wembanyama speaks after receiving his 2023-24 NBA Rookie of the Year trophy during an NBA basketball news conference, Saturday, May 11, 2024, in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Darren Abate)

San Antonio Spurs' Victor Wembanyama, center, watches videos with local children before receiving his 2023-24 NBA Rookie of the Year trophy, Saturday, May 11, 2024, in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Darren Abate)

San Antonio Spurs' Victor Wembanyama, left, greets fans before receiving his 2023-24 NBA Rookie of the Year trophy during an NBA basketball news conference, Saturday, May 11, 2024, in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Darren Abate)

San Antonio Spurs' Victor Wembanyama speaks to media after receiving his 2023-24 NBA Rookie of the Year trophy during an NBA basketball news conference, Saturday, May 11, 2024, in San Antonio. (AP Photo/Darren Abate)

NEW YORK (AP) — Former President Donald Trump laced into Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democrats on Thursday in a pointed and at times bitter speech as he headlined the annual Al Smith charity dinner in New York.

Trump, in remarks that often felt more like a rally speech than a comedy bit, repeatedly criticized Harris over her decision to skip the event, breaking with presidential tradition as she campaigned in Wisconsin. She recorded a video that was played onscreen instead.

“You should have told her the funds were going to bail out the looters and rioters in Minneapolis and then she’d be here,” Trump quipped, urging Catholics to vote for him in response.

“You gotta remember that I’m here and she’s not," he said.

The white-tie dinner raises millions of dollars for Catholic charities and has traditionally offered candidates from both parties the chance to trade lighthearted barbs, poke fun at themselves, and show that they can get along — or at least pretend to — for one night in the election's final stretch.

It's often the last time the two nominees share a stage before Election Day.

Trump delivered a number of one-liners that drew hearty laughs. But he also questioned the mental fitness of Harris and President Joe Biden, commented on second gentleman Doug Emhoff's extramarital affair during his previous marriage, and made a joke about transgender women that echoed his frequent mocking of trans athletes on the campaign trail.

He said at one point that he would offer a couple of self-deprecating jokes before abandoning the effort. “Nope. I’ve got nothing,” he said to laughs.

“I just don’t see the point of taking shots at myself when other people have been shooting at me," he said, referencing his survival of two assassination attempts this year.

Of Biden, he said, “If the Democrats really wanted to have someone not be with us this evening, they would have sent Joe Biden."

Later, he said the current occupant of the White House “can barely talk, barely put together two coherent sentences, who seems to have the mental faculties of a child. This is a person that has nothing going, no intelligence whatsoever. But enough about Kamala Harris.”

In the video she recorded for the occasion, Harris appeared alongside comedian and actress Molly Shannon, who reprised her long-running “Saturday Night Live” character Mary Katherine Gallagher, an awkward Catholic schoolgirl. She also poked fun at Trump for comments he made in Michigan, saying that mocking Catholics in the video would be “like criticizing Detroit in Detroit.”

Harris’ campaign had previously said that, with less than three weeks before Election Day, they wanted her to spend as much time as possible campaigning in battleground states that will decide the election, rather than detouring to heavily Democratic New York. Her team has told organizers that she would be willing to attend the dinner as president if she wins.

Trump was joined at the dinner by his wife, Melania, who has been an infrequent presence on the campaign trail.

The dais included a mix of Trump allies and foes, with various entanglements. They included New York Attorney General Letitia James, who brought a successful civil fraud case against Trump and his business. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who endorsed Trump after dropping his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, attended with his wife, Cheryl Hines.

New York’s embattled Mayor Eric Adams and other top city officials, as well as business leaders and sports and media personalities, were also in attendance. Adams was charged last month with accepting illegal campaign contributions and lavish overseas trips from Turkish officials and businesspeople — a case that was mentioned repeatedly, including by Trump.

Trump has claimed, without evidence, that Adams was targeted by authorities because he criticized Biden’s migrant policies.

“Mayor Adams: Good luck with everything,” Trump said, adding that what Adams faces is “peanuts” compared to his own legal woes.

He also went after former New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, who was repeatedly booed by the crowd.

“To be honest, he was a terrible mayor," Trump said before offering a profanity at a religion-themed event. "I don’t give a s—- if this is comedy or not.”

The dinner was emceed by comedian Jim Gaffigan, who plays Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz on “Saturday Night Live.”

Gaffigan has a history of criticizing Trump. In 2020, he wrote on X, then named Twitter, that “We need to wake up. We need to call trump the con man and thief that he is.”

He largely kept his focus Thursday on others, including Adams, whom he introduced as “brought to you by Turkish Airlines.”

But he offered some hits, including when he referenced allegations that the Trump Organization in the 1970s discriminated against Black renters in its buildings.

“If Vice President Harris wins this election, not only would she be the first female president, a Black woman would occupy the White House, a former Trump residence,” Gaffigan said. “Obviously you wouldn't be renting to her. I mean, that would never happen anyway. Maybe if Doug did the signing.”

Trump's tone echoed his appearance in 2016, when he was joined by his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, and delivered a particularly nasty speech, calling her “corrupt.”

“Hillary believes that it’s vital to deceive the people by having one public policy and a totally different policy in private,” he said to jeers. “For example, here she is tonight, in public, pretending not to hate Catholics.”

Mary Callahan Erdoes, vice chair of the foundation, alluded to that when she introduced Trump, suggesting she hoped for something less caustic.

“You never disappoint. Your wit is absolutely fabulous. And all of us together are going to hope for the best,” she said to laughs.

Trump, too, referenced the performance onstage, saying that, in 2016, he "went overboard. That was like terrible. And I knew I was in trouble midway through."

That didn't stop him, however, from similar attacks.

The Harris campaign responded to Trump's speech with a statement saying it would remind “Americans how unstable he’s become.”

“He may refuse to release his medical records, but every day he makes it clear to the American people that he is not up to the job,” said spokesperson Ammar Moussa.

Trump's sense of humor is often cited by his supporters as key to his appeal. While he infamously glowered through former President Barack Obama’s jokes at his expense during the 2011 White House Correspondents Dinner, he also sometimes pokes fun at himself.

At several rallies this year, he has remarked on his hair after catching a glimpse of himself onscreen.

“What the hell can you do? There’s nothing I can do about it. We’re stuck with it," he joked at a rally in Indiana, Pennsylvania, last month.

Both Trump and Biden, who is Catholic, spoke at a virtual version of the fundraiser in 2020, which was moved online due to concerns over large gatherings at the height of the pandemic.

The Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner is named for the former New York governor, a Democrat who was the first Catholic to receive a major-party nomination for president when he unsuccessfully ran for the White House in 1928.

The event has become a tradition for presidential candidates since Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy appeared together in 1960. In 1996, the Archdiocese of New York decided not to invite then-President Bill Clinton and his Republican challenger, Bob Dole, reportedly because Clinton vetoed a late-term abortion ban.

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks at the 79th annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2024, in New York, as Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of N.Y., and Cardinal Timothy Dolan listen. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks as Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of N.Y., listens at the 79th annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., arrives for the 79th annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Michael Bloomberg arrives for the 79th annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump and former first lady Melania Trump arrive for the 79th annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

House Speaker Mike Johnson of La., arrives for the 79th annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

New York City Mayor Eric Adams, center, and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, left, arrive for the 79th annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of N.Y., and Cardinal Timothy Dolan gesture as Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump watches at the 79th annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump atalks with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of N.Y., at the 79th annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump and former first lady Melania Trump arrive for the 79th annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign event at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre, Tuesday, Oct. 15, 2024, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/John Bazemore)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris waves at Trenton-Mercer Airport, in Mercer County, N.J., before departing en route to Milwaukee, Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

FILE - Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris shake hands before the start of an ABC News presidential debate at the National Constitution Center, Sept. 10, 2024, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)