OKLAHOMA CITY — When the newest NBA champions reached their locker room Sunday night and found a tub of champagne bottles waiting, the team that had all the answers all season long was finally stumped. How, Oklahoma City Thunder players wondered, did one open a bottle of champagne? Isaiah Hartenstein, a backup center, was one … Read more
Perhaps it was only appropriate that an NBA postseason no one would have predicted could not end without yet another plot twist. Despite star point guard Tyrese Haliburton’s playing with a calf injury, the Indiana Pacers staved off elimination Thursday to win Game 6 of the NBA Finals, 108-91, and push the best-of-seven series against … Read more
OKLAHOMA CITY — 6501 S. Meridian Ave. is not the type of place where a championship parade would be expected to kick off. Twenty minutes southwest of downtown Oklahoma City, along a little-used road just outside the city’s international airport, a chain-link fence separates a parking lot with a few dozen spaces from an airplane … Read more
The Thunder will have their first chance to win an NBA championship since they moved to Oklahoma City on Thursday night as they take a 3-2 lead into Game 6 of the NBA Finals against the Indiana Pacers. After the Pacers took a shocking 2-1 lead, the Thunder have rallied back to win the last … Read more
With eight minutes and 30 seconds left in the fourth quarter of Game 5 of the NBA Finals, the Oklahoma City Thunder were reeling. Once leading by as many as 18 points, the Thunder’s lead had been cut to two. In what was shaping up to be a repeat of Game 1, Oklahoma City appeared … Read more
If the lesson of these NBA playoffs is how quickly fortunes can change, then the latest example is the Oklahoma City Thunder. Three days after the Thunder appeared seemingly out of offensive options, fatigued and headed toward a 3-1 series deficit in the best-of-seven NBA Finals, they’re now just one win away from claiming an … Read more
The Oklahoma City Thunder reached the NBA Finals by producing one of the season’s statistical marvels. Their longest losing streak was just two games. And over an eight-month season, they lost consecutive games only two times. For much of Friday night in Indianapolis, it appeared as though the Indiana Pacers were close to doing the … Read more
The Indiana Pacers didn’t need one of their signature improbable comebacks to win Game 3 of the NBA Finals. And because of it, the Oklahoma City Thunder, once the heavy favorite to claim the league championship, will now need a rally of their own to keep their title hopes alive. During a bravura fourth quarter … Read more
This has been Oklahoma City’s formula all season: Lose one game, respond in the next. That’s exactly what the Thunder did in Game 2 of the NBA Finals. Hamilton, Ont., native Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 34 points, Alex Caruso added 20 off the bench and the Thunder beat the Indiana Pacers 123-107 on Sunday night to … Read more