At this point, the Oklahoma City Thunder are chasing NBA history. They’re off to one of the greatest starts the league has ever seen. They sit pretty atop the standings with a historic 23-1 record and eye-popping plus-16.1 point differential.

The reigning NBA champion looks primed to go back-to-back. The 70-win whispers have grown louder. After one of the greatest seasons ever last year, the Thunder have somehow one-upped themselves.

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That has led the rest of the NBA to feel cynical. Because no matter what happens, all roads feel like they lead to the same destination — another OKC championship as Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is on his way to join all-time greats like Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant.

One Hall-of-Famer believes this specific team could dethrone the Thunder. Paul Pierce believes his Boston Celtics are the only hope for the NBA to stop OKC from being an NBA dynasty in the 2020s. He boldly said so on the “No Fouls Given” podcast with Danny Green.

“The Boston Celtics are the only team in the NBA that stands in front of an OKC dynasty,” Pierce said. “Not this year, but generally speaking for the next five years.”

It wasn’t that long ago when everybody thought the Celtics would be the unstoppable machine that the Thunder have become. After they captured the 2024 NBA championship, an inconsistent title defense ended with a Round 2 exit to the New York Knicks.

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To make matters worse, Jayson Tatum tore his Achilles tendon in the playoff series. That’s knocked him out for the entire 2025-26 regular season to this point. Despite that, the Celtics have been a surprise team with a 15-9 record and a respectable plus-6.7 point differential.

“I know Jaylen Brown is playing like an MVP. I know we got championship experience. And we still relatively guys in their prime,” Pierce said. “Everybody ripping them off this year. Everybody saying we’re not a playoff or play-in team. That shows you we the only team, even though we’re rebuilding on the fly.”

It’s an interesting theory. I guess it all comes down to how Tatum returns. Returning from a torn Achilles is always tricky. And some players take longer than others to fully return to form. Even if he comes back for their 2026 NBA playoff run, there’s no guarantee he’ll be an All-NBA player.

And in terms of the bigger picture, I guess it depends on how Boston carves out the rest of the roster. They shed several important pieces to their last title run with Jrue Holiday, Kristaps Porzingis and Al Horford. How they can reclaim that depth will be their big offseason goal.

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For now, though, they’ve been a fun team. And considering how shaky the East is at the top, maybe they can get hot at the right time and go deep in the NBA playoffs. That’s still a long way to go, though.

This article originally appeared on OKC Thunder Wire: Paul Pierce believes Celtics are the only team that can stop Thunder