Built, Not Bought: The Thunder's Homegrown Championship
No superteam. No shortcuts. Just a city, a vision, and a roster that grew up too fast for the league to catch. Edition #253
The Thunder.
The only major pro sports team in Oklahoma just won the whole damn thing.
Led by Sam Presti and coach Mark Daigneault, the Thunder are NBA champions for the first time in Oklahoma City history.
Their last title? You’d have to rewind all the way to 1979, back when they were still the Seattle SuperSonics.
46 years. That’s how long it’s been, though nothing can be sadder than what we just saw from Indiana.
So, how did a bunch of 20-somethings from a small market outsmart the league and storm their way to the top?
Let’s break down the win, the weirdness, and how OKC built a champion from the ground up. We’ll also talk a bit about the Pacers and the immense heartbreak these fans faced.
The Injury That Changed the Game
The unfortunate part for the Pacers really is the fact that they lost Tyrese Haliburton in the first quarter, and he was having a good game to that point—going 3 of 4 on 3-pointers and scoring 9 points. He was averaging 17.7 points and a playoff-leading 9.0 assists on 46% shooting.
Don’t forget about his whopping 197 assists, which is a franchise record for a postseason. Remember, he hit the game-winner in Game One of the series and became the first player in NBA history to hit a game-tying or game-winning shot in the final seconds in all four rounds.
Haliburton injured his Achilles, as his father John later told ESPN.
“I could not imagine that happening in the biggest game of my life,” said Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. “It is so unfortunate. It is not fair.”
The Turning Point
In all honesty, the Pacers didn’t do badly without him to close out the half. They were up by 1.
It was the third quarter where, as they say, “the cookie crumbled.” The Pacers lost all their energy and gave up a 34-point quarter to the OKC Thunder. All the Thunder had to do from there was play defense, and they sealed it.
In that third quarter:
Jalen Williams had 9 points
Chet Holmgren had 23 points
SGA had 6 points and 3 assists
The run was sparked after a Myles Turner three, but in response, all three of those Thunder stars hit threes of their own. T.J. McConnell turned it over twice during that stretch, and while he had an awesome Games 5 and 6—and a good Game 7 offensively—he committed seven turnovers, which is never acceptable, with or without their star player.
Mathurin’s Push, Carlisle’s Close Call
Bennedict Mathurin really pushed for a comeback with around 4:40 to go in the game, using some awesome transition scoring. He brought the lead from 22 down to 12.
They had a very good chance of winning this game—but, uh, maybe a little flopping (at least, that’s what I think) almost led Rick Carlisle to an ejection and killed the rally.
That was all it took.
The Crown Belongs to Shai
Aside from that, though—oh my god, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.
He led all scorers with 29 points and 12 assists. It was the first time since Shaquille O’Neal in 2002 that the same player won the scoring title, league MVP, and Finals MVP. Triple Crown right there.
Finals Averages:
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander: 30.3 PPG, 5.6 APG, 4.6 RPG
Jalen Williams: 23.6 PPG, 5.0 RPG, 3.7 APG
Record-Breaking Season
The Thunder set numerous records this year, but here are four notable ones:
+259 — Best home point differential in a single playoffs
+131 — Best turnover differential in a single playoffs
19–2 — Best record following a loss in a single season
+1247 — Best point differential in a single season
This was pretty interesting.
Heartbreak in Indiana: Respect Where It’s Due
In all honesty, kudos to the Pacers for staying alive in this game without Haliburton. These Pacers love making comebacks, and we saw that in the Finals.
Unfortunately, they didn’t have Haliburton, and it’s really hard to start something when you’re dragging with something like that.
We all know, though, that only one can win. After falling short last year, and making it to the finals, and then fighting every single game, they just couldn’t get the job done against the Thunder this year. Not because they didn’t play well, but because they couldn’t.
The Thunder had contributions from everyone, all series long, no question about that. But, stars are stars because of clutch moments, and the Pacers didn’t have their guy for 75% of the game.
The Genius Behind the Build
More than credit given to the players on the court, Sam Presti, the general manager, deserves a lot of credit as well.
I was planning to make a general manager rankings piece1 (do you remember that series from January?), and the article kind of escaped me, but this was the guy I was going to award.
He’s the one who drafted:
Chet Holmgren
It was he who traded for SGA. No, these five didn’t make up a starting lineup, but three of them are toward the end of their careers and have cemented themselves as legends (maybe Westbrook, I counted him here.), and two of them haven’t even touched their prime yet, but have already opened up discussions of a dynasty after this year’s win.
It’s taken a while for the Thunder to get to this stage, but all that waiting will be for something, because they have something special in Oklahoma City, and one more win, and a new dynasty has begun.
A Champion Built Different
Presti has done a wonderful job operating this roster, especially coming from a small-market team. OKC is 5th in cap space, meaning they won a championship, and they aren’t even paying their players that much.
Meanwhile:
Minnesota, the team that lost to the Thunder, ranks 30th, at -96 million
Phoenix, which didn’t even make the playoffs, ranks 29th, at -87 million
46 years ago, they were champions in Seattle.
Today, they’re champions in Oklahoma.
A city that was never supposed to have a team just built the best one in basketball.
And with youth, vision, and cap space on their side, this most definitely is not the end.
It’s the beginning.
I’m going to be analyzing Sam Presti and how he broke the NBA very soon.