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The Oklahoma City Thunder concluded their run to their first National Basketball Association title in franchise history at home with a 103-91 triumph over the Indiana Pacers. This was the seventh and final game of this year’s league playoffs. The Thunder previously played in Washington state as the Seattle Supersonics, winning the 1979 championship.
As far as the excitement and drama of game seven NBA lore, this contest failed to measure up to the epic theater of the last NBA game seven, the deciding game between the Cleveland Cavaliers and Golden State Warriors back in 2016, but it had mini moments of entertainment and sorrow.
The sorrow moment of this contest came when the Pacers’ star guard Tyrese Haliburton suffered an Achilles tendon injury that knocked him out of the game at the 5:02 mark of the opening quarter. The Pacer guard scored nine quick points to help his team stay even with the Thunder. Ironically, he was injured at nearly the identical spot on the floor where he suffered a grade two sprain of his right calf muscle in game five of this series.
Through intense therapy, he was able to recover enough to play in game six of the series and gambled that his injured right leg would stand the strain of one more game. It did not.
His bold attempt to play drew applause from his Indiana teammates and Pacers fans, and respect from basketball enthusiasts in general. Haliburton said, “If I can walk, I am going to play,” following his initial injury to his right calf. Achilles tendon surgery and lengthy rehabilitation is now what it costs for his decision to push his injured leg past its breaking point.
And for those who say he made the right decision, there are just as many who hold the opposing view. Mentioning him in his postgame comments, his coach said, “He authored one of the great individual playoff runs in the history of the NBA with dramatic play after dramatic play. It was just something that no one’s ever seen and [he] did it as one of 17. You know, that’s the beautiful thing about him. As great a player as he is, it’s always a team thing. And so, our hearts go out to him.”
This marks the third Achilles injury to a star player in this 2025 playoff season. Both Jayson Tatum of the Celtics and Milwaukee Bucks’ star Damion Lillard went down with Achilles tendon injuries, and both, according to reports, had difficulties with their calves before their season-ending tears. Kevin Durant suffered the same fate in 2019 during NBA Finals game five. He missed two months of the season with a strained calf.
Back to the game itself, the Pacers played tough for the first 24 minutes of action and took a 48-47 lead into halftime thanks to a three-point shot by Andrew Nembhard with 3.6 seconds before intermission.
The Thunder turned up their defensive intensity in the third quarter, forcing the Pacers into seven turnovers during a 19-2 run. By the time the quarter concluded, Oklahoma City had outscored Indiana 34-20 to gain a 16-point advantage heading into the final 12 minutes of play.
T.J. McConnell, who scored 10 of his 16 points in the third quarter, Pascal Siakam, who had 16 points and four rebounds, Benedict Mathurin, who had 24 points, 13 rebounds and two steals, and Nembhard, who scored 15 points, put forth valiant efforts but could not withstand the Oklahoma City storm.
Led by Finals Most Valuable Player Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who had 29 points on 8-for27 shooting, 12 assists (a playoff high), and added five rebounds, two blocked shots and committed one turnover, the Thunder clicked. Oklahoma City also got significant contributions from Jalen Williams, who had 20 points on 6-for-20 shooting, four rebs, four assists and two steals, and Chet Holmgren, who scored 18 points with eight rebounds and five blocked shots.
OKC had enough to hold off a determined Pacers squad and become the youngest NBA championship team in 48 years and the second youngest team in league history (average age 25.68 years) to win a title.
“The best memory I will take from this game seven is the fun I had tonight and winning an NBA title with my teammates,” said Gilgeous-Alexander. He becomes the first player in 25 years to win the regular season Most Valuable Player Award, the league scoring title, and Finals MVP Award, and only the fourth player behind Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (1971), Michael Jordan (1991, ’92, ’96, ’98), and Shaquille O’Neal (2000) to pull off the feat.
Thunder coach Mark Daigneault, the seventh coach in NBA history with multiple game seven wins (0 losses) enroute to a title, said, “My team is an uncommon group of young men that play unselfishly and for each other. And now they are NBA champions.”
The immediate thought is that this young Thunder team can make a run at repeating as NBA champs next season. Recent history suggests that OKC will face a major challenge in reaching that goal. The last NBA team to record back-to-back titles was the 2017-18 Golden State Warriors.
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