Starters stake Thunder to West 1 seed
OKLAHOMA CITY – Thumbs flipped back and forth between broadcast and app, score and sequence. None of the NBA Western Conference’s top teams controlled their destiny. All Oklahoma City Thunder fans could do amid the intertwined, three-team race for the West’s first seed was dart its eyes between the Minnesota Timberwolves and Denver Nuggets games.
The Thunder took care of their part. After playing their usual starters in a 135-86 win Sunday, the Thunder mangled the short-handed Mavericks, stuffing them into a locker to run away with the West’s No. 1 seed.
All it took was brushing up against history; the greedy Thunder scored 82 first-half points, a season high and just a point short of a franchise record. Endless, effortless buckets.
From Shai Gilgeous-Alexander who stepped back into 15 points in 15 minutes. From Chet Holmgren, who scored 13 points on 6 of 8 shooting. The Thunder led for so long, bludgeoning the Mavs for 48 minutes, that it saw all 15 active players score in the game – a first for the franchise.
But the result – or how OKC got there – felt as insignificant as any. A win meant a historic finish for the Thunder. It meant squeezing their way out of a cage match of a Northwest Division battle. It meant OKC was the youngest team in NBA history to secure the No. 1 seed.
As the Thunder play the waiting game with their play-in counterparts before Sunday’s first-round opener, one thing feels clear: Everything about the Thunder’s close to the regular season feels more like an arrival than an appearance. Like the first installment in a prophecy, far from the end of a chapter.
The baby-faced No. 1 seed, now etched into Thunder history
Chet Holmgren, even with his typical slump and curious glaze, hunched over to unzip his hoodie when prompted by a question Sunday evening. He’d been asked how such an ever-present Thunder team would celebrate the mark of a successful season.
Underneath his black hoodie was a Thunder blue T-shirt, newly printed and displaying the bragging rights behind OKC’s Northwest Division title. Not a big change from his usual Nike tech suits, but an understandable twist.
Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams followed in their media availability session dressed like it was fashion week. An assortment of leather and mesh, big pants and forgotten shoes, shades that covered their expressions. Where were their shirts?
“This leather jacket cost a lot,” Williams said, a reasonable excuse.
This is the youth that Oklahoma City wore during a historic season. This is the personified NBA adolescence of the league’s youngest No. 1 seed in history.
Holmgren had no excuse, an eager rookie just having completed an exhausted 82 games. The shirt, just a shade different from the white tee he’d otherwise wear underneath, was a badge of honor.
Gilgeous-Alexander, though, has seen this vision play out. He’s had years to mull it over, to live through the plummet and the sooner-than-expected rise. To envision what winning looks like, struck by the pictures of celebration like Raven Baxter.
And in his eyes, there’s far more to this season. He’d never thought about being part of a team that’s now the face of the intersection between youth and success. Or being the face of that. It happened, and there’s not much time to think about it.
“I don’t really think about it like that,” Gilgeous-Alexander said. “Always just take it day-by-day. I always focus on me getting better. As a player, as a leader, as a teammate. … We’re able to look up now and be proud of where we’re at, knowing there’s a lot more work to do.”
It marks just the second time in the Thunder’s 15-year history that they secured the No. 1 seed. A franchise that’s seen a decade of success, housing some of the NBA’s greatest stars. One that, once the smoke cleared and the band broke up, ended up in a two-year rebuild in hopes of finding its way back.
All it took was a few young bulls. The Thunder will have to wait until Friday before its opponent is revealed. Until then, it can bask in its regular-season glory to coach Mark Daigneault’s detest. Fifty-seven wins. An MVP-caliber season from its star player. An unfathomable leap from its play-in standing a year ago.
Even during the Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook era of the Thunder, OKC only secured the first seed just once. It secured the No. 2 seed twice, and the No. 3 seed once.
Williams has been openly appreciative of the Thunder’s history. Of what Westbrook’s intensity meant to him as a child, of what the Thunder atmosphere looked like from afar. Now he’s part of a team that’s etched its name in regularseason proximity.
“It’s dope,” Williams said. “I think just me growing up and seeing it, I think time goes by faster than you realize. Now I’m part of that, I think that’s really cool. … It’s cool to be a part of that. It’s something we don’t take for granted.”
Chet Holmgren playing all 82
He didn’t want to jinx himself or misspeak, but then again, it would’ve taken a strong argument to keep Chet Holmgren from himself.
After missing the duration of what would’ve been his rookie season with a Lisfranc injury, Holmgren refused to sit out of games this seasson. With No. 82 in the balance, a possible time for him to rest despite the Thunder in a three-way race for the first seed, Holmgren noted it hadn’t been decided.
But if it was up to him, he’d play. And he did, conquering a season that comes with the level of wear and tear that skeptics predicted he couldn’t handle.
“Without going into a whole preach and everything, it means a lot,” Holmgren said after OKC’s Friday win over Milwaukee. Then he proceeded to preach.
“I didn’t necessarily come into the season like, ‘this is my main goal in the season, to play every game,’ because there’s so many things that can happen. … As it’s been closing in and I have the opportunity to play all 82, it definitely means something to me.”
He closed his sermon by making his rounds of gratitude: “I also feel like I owe it to my teammates and all the people who helped me throughout last year – from medical staff, to the coaches – to go out there and try to help us win games.”
Holmgren entered Sunday’s slate as the league leader among rookies in minutes played at 2,401. Charlotte’s Brandon Miller trailed just behind him at 2,383. Then there’s a gap, with 7-foot-4 Spurs rookie Victor Wembanyama’s head peeking from the other side. He’d played 2,106.
Holmgren will understandably feel love for successfully insisting on playing 82 games just a year removed from a freak injury. For playing through periods of exhaustion with the workload this team gives him. But rookie Cason Wallace also played every game this season.
The pair joined Russell Westbrook as the only three rookies in Thunder history to play 82 games in their rookie season.
With the time the Thunder have between Sunday and the playoffs Holmgren will get a level of rest he hasn’t received all season. Perpetual sleep-walking stare aside, the last time Holmgren received moderate rest was the All-Star break. In the three games that followed, he averaged 23.7 points, 9.3 rebounds and 2.7 blocks while shooting 52.6% from 3.
“I think if you look at the pop he got out of All-Star break that’s a good proxy for it,” Daigneault said of a rested Holmgren. “It’s hard playing in the NBA 30 minutes for a rookie player, for anybody. Not only the physical toll, people don’t understand the mental toll. They’re learning so quickly, cognitively it’s a load for them.
“Everything’s new … I think every rookie goes through that, I’d be lying if I didn’t say he’s gone through that, but the thing that makes him really good is he’s a glutton for that pain. He’s like, bring it on.”