Shai Gilgeous-Alexander knew a fast start was required and he delivered, powering the Oklahoma City Thunder to a 149-106 beatdown of the Denver Nuggets in Game 2 of their Eastern Conference semi-final.
Gilgeous-Alexander poured in 27 of his 34 points in the first quarter to outscore Denver by himself and put his team firmly in position to level the series at 1-1.
“We came out desperate,” he said.
“I definitely wanted to put an imprint on the game from the get [go] without trying to force anything, and ultimately still just let the game tell me what to do.
“The game’s going to test me. Every possession down, they’re going to throw a coverage at me, and I have to make the right decision, make the right answer. I think I did a pretty good job in the first quarter.”
Whole lotta buckets 🫡
8️⃣ guys scored in double figures tonight 👏 pic.twitter.com/2FvjNikF6H
— OKC THUNDER (@okcthunder) May 8, 2025
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Daigneault plays down performance – that’s how we’ve been all season
The result was never in doubt afterwards as the Thunder racked up 87 points by the half.
“I didn’t really look at tonight as a response as much as I looked at tonight as just us being who we are,” said coach Mark Daigneault, whose side lost Game 1 121-119.
“And that’s how we’ve been all season. We don’t really respond to the last game when we win, we don’t have more confidence. When we lose, we don’t have more urgency. I think this team has a really good baseline that we just try to return to every day when the sun comes up.”
We got ‘punked’
Nuggets coach David Adelman admitted his side got “punked” but Gilgeous-Alexander was eager to stress there is still a lot of work to do, starting tomorrow night in Game 3.
He said: “I think it’s important to take the emotion out. Winning by a hundred or winning by two, it’s still 1-1, and I think that’s very important.
“Like I said, especially in the series, every game’s going to look different. People are going to make adjustments. It’s going to be a different crowd, a different feel. You’re going to start hot; you’re going to start cold, everything’s going to look different. It’s important to turn the page.”
