SAN ANTONIO — How do you prepare for 7-foot-4?

“I don’t know if you can,” said Josh Hart, “because there’s not a situation that’s similar.”

It’s the question of the hour, the day — perhaps the season — for a Knicks team standing four wins from its first NBA championship since 1973.

Back then, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was the tallest player in the league at 7-foot-2. He was a traditional center, a dominant one, but still recognizable within the confines of basketball history.

Victor Wembanyama is something else entirely.

He’s an alien. A unicorn. The kind of player video games won’t even let you create without putting hard caps on the attributes he possesses.

“Yeah, watching him as a player, it’s pretty unbelievable,” said team captain Jalen Brunson. “The things he’s able to do on both sides of the ball, people have never really seen before for a person of his size. It’s incredible to watch from a player’s perspective.”

If the Knicks are going to pull off the impossible — if they’re going to end a 53-year championship drought — it begins with finding an answer for a player few teams have been able to solve.

Wembanyama averaged 25 points, 11 rebounds, three assists and three blocks during the regular season and has largely maintained that production throughout the playoffs. Now, he’s hellbent on securing his first NBA championship in Year 3 of what’s sure to be a Hall of Fame career.

The Knicks are in his way. They don’t intend on moving any time soon.

“For us, I think if we focus on ourselves and focus on the habits that we’re building, we’ll put ourselves in good situations to be successful,” Hart said. “We can’t focus too much on one player and focus on Wemby too much because obviously they’ve got a lot of extremely talented guys that can go off any single game. We’re focused on them as a whole. But he’s an interesting guy to game plan for.”

Cautious giant

Victor Wembanyama does not answer questions immediately.

He pauses. Sometimes for a second. Sometimes for two or three. Then he reaches for the microphone.

His answers are calculated, measured and deliberate, the demeanor of a player wise well beyond his 22 years on Earth. He took another pause Tuesday on NBA Finals Media Day when asked about the Knicks, the final opponent standing between the Spurs and the Larry O’Brien Trophy Wembanyama believes he was put on the planet to chase.

“It’s a great team, you know? It’s a great team of experienced guys who are not here by chance, but by relentless effort over the years. Very different career paths for all of them,” he said. “They’re right where they’re supposed to be, in my opinion. All of them are going to be super hungry in their own way.”

The Knicks would be wise to mirror that same approach — calculated, measured and disciplined — in their effort to slow down the league’s newest superstar.

New York beat San Antonio twice during the regular season: once in the NBA Cup Final in December and again on March 1 at Madison Square Garden. In the Spurs’ lone victory, however, Wembanyama scored 31 points and missed only two shots. The Knicks lost by two. It was also the beginning of a stretch in which they dropped nine of 11 games entering the 2026 calendar year.

“I think those games matter, those regular-season games matter. But [they’re a] really well-coached team, really talented team. You can tell how together they are, which is very dope,” Mikal Bridges said. “But with all that, they’re ready to go out there and fight. They’re going to battle. Watching them in the playoffs, [they’re] not soft at all. They’re going to go out there, compete at a high level. It’s great. I feel like we do the same.”

Both teams have changed dramatically since then.

The Knicks run a far more democratic offense than the one they leaned on earlier in the season. The Spurs are healthier, deeper and more experienced. What was once viewed as a weakness — their youth — has become one of their greatest strengths, though there’s nothing within the corridors of the Frost Bank Arena quite like its franchise cornerstone, the player whose very existence defies all basketball logic.

“As an opposing player, [Wemby] is something you constantly have to be on watch for. You just never know the things that he’s capable of doing,” Brunson said. “That’s why game planning and our game-planning discipline, our attention to details are so important when it comes to playing because he’s pretty incredible.”

Tough matchup

If any team has a chance to throw enough bodies at Wembanyama to make life difficult, it’s probably these Knicks.

They can put Karl-Anthony Towns on him one possession, OG Anunoby on the next, then survive a switch involving Hart before bringing Mitchell Robinson off the bench. They can play two 7-footers. They can go small and try to make him work in space.

Whether any of it actually works is another question entirely.

“Obviously he’s a special talent, and the NBA is blessed to have him and for him to be able to showcase his talent to the world,” Towns said. “For us, we just have to have discipline in our game plan and execute at a high level.”

Much of the assignment is expected to fall on Anunoby, the Knicks’ premier perimeter defender and a Second Team All-Defense selection who has a legitimate case he belonged on the First Team.

“He’s pretty unique. I mean, there’s little things like maybe guarding [Nikola] Jokic or [Kristaps] Porzingis or Joel [Embiid]. He’s different. He’s taller,” Anunoby said. “Just being aware of where he’s at all over the floor. He can do everything. Super talented. Just being aware of him at all times, trying to make it as difficult as possible.”

Maybe the hyper-focus on Wembanyama is exactly what San Antonio wants.

The Spurs aren’t here because of one player alone. As shown in the conference finals stunner against the reigning champion Oklahoma City Thunder, they’re one of the deepest young teams in basketball. Stephon Castle and Dylan Harper look destined for multiple All-Star appearances. De’Aaron Fox already has one on his résumé. Devin Vassell and Julian Champagnie can shoot the lights out. Even Luke Kornet has given the Knicks problems in the past.

“Yeah, they’re a very versatile team, very deep. They have talent all over the court, at all positions. They can all shoot, drive, do everything. And they rebound really well, too,” Anunoby said. “They’re getting the rebound, they can push, one-man fast break. They can push the pace. They really speed the game up. They do a great job doing that.”

The Spurs aren’t in the NBA Finals because of one player. One player, however, has changed the entire trajectory of a franchise back into the title hunt after six years missing the playoffs altogether.

That’s what makes the challenge so daunting. Every opponent enters a series against San Antonio knowing exactly where the danger lies. And nobody has found a real answer anyway.

The Knicks have spent 53 years searching for another championship. They’re four wins away now. Every road to a title has a final obstacle.

This one just happens to be 7-foot-4.

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