OKC 125 DEN 93 (Thunder win conference semifinals 4-3)
After a painful, here-we-go-again start saw the Nuggets up 21-10 halfway through the first quarter, the Thunder players flipped Loud City's switch from jittery to electrified in a raucous, overwhelming victory to advance to the Western Conference Finals for the first time since 2016.
OKC stormed from that early deficit to a 14-point halftime lead, as Mark Daigneault's smaller-ball, shortened rotation produced a 50-25 run through the rest of the first half. In a throwback to the first 49 games of the Thunder's 2024-25 season, when one or both of Chet Holmgren and Isaiah Hartenstein were sidelined, the guards in OKC's mighty, micro frontcourt terrorized Nikola Jokic (20 pts, 9 rbs, 7 ast, 5 TOs, 200 flops) and the Denver bigs (including Aaron Gordon, playing on a hamstring...strain), generating an avalanche of turnovers and transition points. All told, OKC yoinked 16 steals and won the turnover battle 22-9 like old times.
It was Alex Caruso (11 pts, 3 stl, 3 ast, 1 potential all-time championship addition) winning both the interior, undersized fight against Jokic and leading the Thunder's passing-lane-blitzkrieg. Cason Wallace (7 pts, 5 ast, 2 stl, 1 cathartic Joker Poster) and Chet (13 pts, 11 rbs, 2 stk) played large in the smaller rotation, while both iHart and Lu Dort were reduced to 17 minutes of playtime. Jaylin Williams didn't sub into the game until garbage time.
In short, the Thunder played like themselves. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (35 pts, 4 ast, 4 stk) was the composed, MVP conductor of OKC's orchestral mosh pit, mixing graceful footwork and touch on offense with a frenzied gauntlet of contests and deflections on defense. He accelerated from 4 first quarter points, to 8 in the second, to 11 in the third, to 12 backbreaking points in his brief fourth quarter run. Like so often in the regular season, Shai turned out the lights with his third three-pointer of the game, directing a friendly bounce off the front of the rim with his follow through then checking out with with 7:40 remaining and the Thunder up 38. It was "an annihilation", as Mike Breen dubbed it over a slow-mo JDub celebration (24 points, 7 assists, and a dozen fast break highlights during his 17-point second quarter).
This is how good the Thunder were before this series, and they are finally playing like themselves again. Despite the Nuggets' strong play and Jokic's superpowers, I predicted OKC would be in the midst of a blowout before halftime because, 3-3 series start not withstanding, they are the much better team. And they pretty much proved me right within a few minutes of the third quarter, extending their 60-46 lead out to 71-48 by making their dunks and their threes. Now that the dust has finally settled against a title-tested Denver team, even a hard-fought, seven-game triumph feels like a reinforcement of the Thunder's strength.
Next up: The Thunder stay home to play a well-rested Minnesota to open the conference finals on Tuesday.