It is no secret that the OKC Thunder are at the pinnacle of NBA dominance, and they are the team that the rest of the league has circled on their calendars.
They have excelled to the point where many news outlets have been raving about their talent, cohesion, and chances to break the single-season wins record when all is said and done.
Even after a two-point loss to the San Antonio Spurs during the NBA Cup Semifinals, the Thunder continued to prove why they belong in the history books. Following the contest, Jalen Williams verbalized it.
The All-Star explained how "average" teams think when they lose a game in the in-season tournament, and he compared it to OKC's mentality after their own crushing demise.
“I think an average team would probably be like, ‘Oh, it’s the Cup. Whatever. We lost one. We’re 24-2.’ We can go home and just hang our hat on that, or we can look at it as a way to get better and understand that we played against a playoff team that beat us," Williams said. "That's how we'll look at it from a competitive standpoint. I think that’s why we’ve been so good this year, is holding ourselves to a different standard.”
Thunder possess mindset necessary to keep Larry O'Brien in OKC
Throughout the season, we've seen the Thunder adopt a "get better every day" mentality, a frame of mind that represents a commitment to process rather than result.
For a team that has already achieved the result every player in the league desperately covets, it's impressive that such a young group has been able to maintain laser focus on "the next game" instead of drifting off into daydreams of June.
J-Dub's postgame comments highlight the type of culture Presti has put together throughout the years.
It's one thing to assemble a talented squad. Plenty of general managers do that every year.
However, it's another thing to build a franchise around delayed gratification, character, and selflessness. It takes sacrifice to win a championship, and Oklahoma City showed that in its playoff run last season.
To win two in a row, as Williams highlighted in his remarks, takes a willingness to set aside complacency and take every loss as if it's Game Seven of the NBA Finals -- even if it is just your second loss of the season.
With this attitude, the Thunder should have no problem moving forward the rest of the season. Another date with superstar Victor Wembanyama and a rising Spurs team awaits on December 23rd, and it will be intriguing to see how they tackle the up-and-coming squad in their second go-around.
Oklahoma City's discipline will be tested beforehand, however, as they face the Grizzlies and the Wolves in two of their next three games.
These teams are more than capable of knocking off this OKC juggernaut if they don't maintain focus on the game at hand.