OKLAHOMA CITY — After having the best scoring game of his pro career, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander didn’t feel like it was that special of a night.
In the Oklahoma City Thunder’s first game since losing Chet Holmgren for at least two months because of a hip fracture, Gilgeous-Alexander poured in a career-high 45 points, 9 assists and 5 steals to lift his club to a 134-126 win over the LA Clippers before 17,430 at Paycom Center.
“It didn’t feel special,” Gilgeous-Alexander said of his 14th career 40-point game. “It didn’t feel like I did something I’d never done before. Just felt like another basketball game. I felt like I should have had more, missed some easy shots, but [that’s] the game.”
Perhaps the career outing didn’t feel extraordinary because Gilgeous-Alexander is fixated on a more important goal. After reaching the second round but losing to the Dallas Mavericks as the top seed in the Western Conference, Gilgeous-Alexander has been focused on getting the Thunder (9-2) and his young teammates better prepared for a deeper run in the playoffs.
“I don’t say this to slight my teammates,” Gilgeous-Alexander explained. “But I feel like the end of our season last year in the playoffs, obviously for a lot of them, it was the first time in the playoffs and playing games that meaningful. And I don’t want to say they weren’t ready, but I feel like I could have equipped them better throughout the year in taking [certain] shots, getting to spots and being more comfortable in certain positions on the court, especially offensively.
“I feel like in the playoffs we were good defensively and offensively is why we lost. And part of my job is to make sure that my teammates are confident and are ready for big moments.”
After watching Holmgren take a hard spill in a loss to Golden State on Sunday and suffering a right iliac hip fracture that will be re-evaluated in eight to 10 weeks, Gilgeous-Alexander and his teammates had to move on and be ready to win while playing small ball against the Clippers one night later. The Thunder are small with big men Holmgren, Isaiah Hartenstein (non-displaced left hand fracture) and Jaylin Williams (hamstring) all sidelined.
While Holmgren played in all 82 regular-season games last season, he missed his first NBA season after he was drafted second overall in the 2022 draft because of a Lisfranc injury.
“We’ve been there before,” Gilgeous-Alexander said of playing small. “We’ve won games playing small and we can do it again.”
The Thunder led by as much as 20 before watching the Clippers make a furious run to get within two with 42.3 seconds left. Norm Powell continued his torrid start to the season by scoring 29-of-his-31 points and making 10-of-12 shots, including 5-of-6 3-pointers, all in the second half before fouling out late.
But Gilgeous-Alexander scored 10 of his points in the final 5:25, including making two free throws with 22.7 seconds left to stop the Clippers’ run.
Clippers coach Ty Lue said before the game that Gilgeous-Alexander is at a level only a select group of all-time great superstars have reached where they can let the game come to them and take over late.
“As a younger player, you can tend to get out of control or try to get my points,” Lue said before the game. “He knows it’s going to come to him the style they play, he knows the ball’s going to come back. He allows other guys to get going, allows other guys that he’s trust with the basketball [to score early].
“But he knows that at any point in time he can take over the game. He reminds you a lot of the greats like [Michael] Jordan.”
Gilgeous-Alexander became the first player in Thunder/SuperSonics franchise history to record at least 45 points and five steals in a game.
But Gilgeous-Alexander, 26, has much bigger feats in mind and that is why he has been constantly thinking about how he can get his team better prepared to win playoff games on a nightly basis — something that some stars don’t realize or do until after several playoff runs or when they’re older.
“When we lost [to Dallas], I thought about why we lost and obviously there’s so many things to nitpick,” Gilgeous-Alexander said. “But I can only control what I can control and I try to look at it from through that lens.
“A lot of people don’t recognize it until it’s too late. And I don’t want it to be too late, so I tried to hit it on the head early.”