Look closely enough, and you could spot the wrinkles forming around Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s cheeks. The beard sprouting onto Jalen Williams’ bare face. The experiences in Chet Holmgren’s eyes.
They’ve been asked to grow quickly; a demanding second half here, an avalanche of a run in a fourth quarter another night. Their IDs were checked Sunday afternoon, and they barged their way into a 127-103 win over the Nuggets.
The young bulls have seen enough of these to say they can do more than hang.
“We have greatness among us,” veteran Alex Caruso said. “When we play at our highest level, we’re a great team. It’s just about doing it consistently, and matching the pedigree play-after-play with some of these top teams.
“From the beginning of the game today, (Denver) came in like they were playing against the top team in the West. We came in like it was a noon game against the Nuggets on Sunday. …. When we play at an elite level we’re, in my opinion, the best team in the world.”
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Sunday’s fourth quarter was what Caruso had in mind. The firm shut of a door left afar. Anyone’s game became Oklahoma City’s declaration.
More: Who will win NBA MVP race? Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Nikola Jokic are both chasing history
Fourteen seconds into the period, Denver was down just one, 86-85. Role players can swing games — Christian Braun and Michael Porter Jr., who combined for 38 points before the final quarter, threatened to — but stars tend to win them.
The Thunder’s budding trio seized the moment.
Williams was everything the Thunder needed him to be. 13 of his 26 points came in the fourth, along with five of his 11 free throw attempts. He finished with nine boards and eight assists. Making the right reads became his mission. Few, if any of his touches, felt forced.
He admitted how boring it sounded that he was taking what the game was giving him. But it signals that Williams isn’t overthinking the way he has in the past, and the force he hopes to play with likely follows.
“Always having that mindset that people have to react to what I’m doing,” Williams said.
See a gap, kill it. See a corner, turn it. See the rim, headbutt it.
“When he wins his minutes, when he’s the best version of himself, we’re pretty hard to beat,” Gilgeous-Alexander said of Williams.
In a 20-second span in the fourth, Holmgren made two plays that helped spur a run: He wrapped around the rim like silly putty for a freakish two-hand slam. One Denver timeout later, he muzzled Russell Westbrook’s shot at the rim.
He was a game-high plus-32, adding 14 points, eight boards and four blocks in 25 minutes, all despite five fouls attempting to weigh his slim frame down.
“Just thinking the game,” Caruso said of where OKC’s young stars have improved. “Their abilities will carry them to the end. But being able to be smart while not overthinking, seeing matchups, seeing how teams are guarding, adjusting, communicating through that and raising the levels of everybody else — that’s the biggest thing.”
Through three quarters, MVP candidates Nikola Jokic and Gilgeous-Alexander collided by the horns like a pair of goats attempting to assert dominance. Those 36 minutes are all they typically need to do their damage.
But neither was nearly as efficient as their seasons have been. Gilgeous-Alexander had attempted nearly as many shots (28) as he’d scored points (31). Jokic, in bizarre fashion, had more shots (21) than points (19).
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They trudged through a game that had all the signs of a noon matinee, abysmal shooting the most prominent symptom.
But the moment, an ABC game that begged for one of these megastars to grip the audience, was too much to pass on. Gilgeous-Alexander summoned the version of him that’s already won scores of games. He scored nine points in the fourth, all seemingly pivotal, to finish with 40 points, eight boards and five assists.
Jokic scored just five points in the period (and ended with 24-13-9 on 23 shots). Isaiah Hartenstein, Jaylin Williams and Holmgren each took turns taking on Jokic.
The Nuggets shot just 35%, scoring 43 points in the second half.
Sunday marked the fewest turnovers OKC has forced in a game all season. Nearly everything it did was grinded out in the halfcourt. A war was won on missed shots.
OKC doesn’t have the postseason scars like Jokic and his Nuggets, with gashes symbolically dressing his arms. Or the Celtics, who kicked and screamed for nearly a decade before dominance.
But in this moment — on a Sunday with MVP race obsessors tallying mistakes, with the value of OKC’s West-leading regular season win count still questioned by its detractors — Gilgeous-Alexander and his Thunder were called to collect. SGA came through whistling like Omar Little, prepared to stamp his name.
Fitting for the competitor he is, Gilgeous-Alexander waited until the final 12 minutes to enhance his precision. He’s willing to reserve fourth quarters for admirable adversaries.
A man gotta have a code.
SGA’s MVP statement
Any attempt to frame SGA’s competitive fire should come back to a first-half sequence in Sunday’s win.
Gilgeous-Alexander, not met with nearly as many blitzes or traps as he’s seen in recent weeks, flowed to the rim often. One of the few times he was stood up at the rim was by Jokic, a journey downhill that the big man batted away with two hands.
On the very next possession, Gilgeous-Alexander led a two-on-one break. He opted to soar past Jokic, picking up an and-one.
If it wasn’t that drive that convinced those tuning in of what Shai is made of, maybe it was the next. Or the next. Or the dizzying pull-up jumpers. Jokic got a heavy dose of them all. SGA never stopped.
“I’ve been around great competitors through my years in the league, and he’s up there with the best of them,” Caruso said.
Added Jokic: “He doesn’t complicate. … He’s a really good defender, shot-blocker. But I think the most, he doesn’t try to do too much. He’s feeding the team, and he’s really good for them.”
Of all the things foremost in Jokic’s mind after being trumped by perhaps the NBA’s best scorer was Shai the…shotblocker. In fairness, Gilgeous-Alexander blocked one of his shots from the helpside, and in the same half blocked Jamal Murray on a drive.
That these two can both be so impactful across multiple facets of the game in their own ways is what’s heated up their race even further. That the race exists in large part because of how much SGA has contributed to winning seems to be what he’s taken solace in.
“It’s been very fun,” said Gilgeous-Alexander, asked if he can appreciate his MVP chase with Jokic. “Most of the appreciation comes from, honestly, my teammates. No matter how good of a basketball player I am, if we don’t check the win column as much as we do, the conversation wouldn’t be the conversation.”
Without wins, SGA and his Thunder weren’t allowed a seat at the table. Even with 53 wins, 12 games ahead in the West standings before these teams meet again Monday, the sturdiness of Gilgeous-Alexander’s case has been questioned.
But he got what he wanted out of Sunday: a win. And in chasing that the way he has for a season, perhaps he won over the people, too.
Thunder vs. Nuggets
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