Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scores 37 as Oklahoma City beat Phoenix Suns\u00a0120-107 in the Western Conference playoff series.<\/p>\n
Published On 23 Apr 202623 Apr 2026<\/p>\n
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 37 points and dished out \u200c\u200cnine assists, leading Oklahoma City to a 120-107 home win over the Phoenix Suns and giving the \u2060\u2060Thunder a 2-0 lead in \u2060\u2060a first-round Western Conference playoff series.<\/p>\n
The victory on Wednesday, however, might have been a costly one for the hosts.<\/p>\n
Thunder player Jalen Williams, who was limited to just 33 games during the regular season due to injuries, left the \u2060\u2060game midway through the third quarter due to a left hamstring injury.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll take a look at it in the next couple of days, and we\u2019ll update you guys appropriately,\u201d Oklahoma City coach Mark Daigneault said of Williams\u2019 status post-game.<\/p>\n
Williams pulled up during \u2060\u2060a drive towards the bucket and then grabbed at his hamstring as action went the other way.<\/p>\n
Williams, who did not return, missed two long stretches of the season with injuries to his right wrist and right hamstring.<\/p>\n
Before getting hurt, Williams was excellent, logging 19 points on 7-of-11 shooting and four assists in 23 minutes.<\/p>\n
Oklahoma City seized control in the third quarter, thanks in large \u200c\u200cpart to Gilgeous-Alexander and Chet Holmgren.<\/p>\n
Holmgren grabbed rebounds on each of the first three possessions of the half and had 11 points and three blocks in the quarter, while Gilgeous-Alexander had 12 points and four assists in the period.<\/p>\n
Holmgren finished with 19 points, eight rebounds and four blocks.<\/p>\n
The Thunder stretched their lead to 23 with a 13-2 run to end the third and then to 26 early in the fourth.<\/p>\n
The Suns cut the deficit to 10 with nearly four minutes remaining, but coming out of a timeout, Ajay Mitchell hit a 3-pointer to stretch the gap \u2060\u2060to 113-100.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe did a really good job building the lead that we did in the \u2060\u2060third heading into the fourth,\u201d Daigneault said. \u201cObviously the fourth was a little wacky. We\u2019ll watch that \u2026 But generally, it was a good one. We built a strong lead and were able to hold it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Phoenix\u2019s Dillon Brooks scored 13 of his 30 points in the fourth.<\/p>\n
After a slow start in \u2060\u2060Game 1, Gilgeous-Alexander missed his first three shots on Wednesday, then found the range. He hit 7 of 10 shots the rest of the first half.<\/p>\n
After going 5 of 18 from \u2060\u2060the field in the series opener, Gilgeous-Alexander finished 13 of 25 in Game \u2060\u20602.<\/p>\n
\u201cShai made the right play all night,\u201d Daigneault said. \u201cHis floor game was outstanding. He got us really good shots.\u201d<\/p>\n
Early in the third quarter, Brooks and Oklahoma City\u2019s Luguentz Dort got tangled up battling for a potential rebound off a free throw. The two quickly stepped away from each other, but each \u200c\u200cwas whistled for a technical foul.<\/p>\n
Late in the quarter, Devin Booker was called for a technical after bouncing the ball off Williams while trying to keep it in play.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a playoff series so a lot of stuff happens,\u201d \u200c\u200csaid \u200c\u200cSuns coach Jordan Ott, who added that he did not get an explanation of the call. \u201cWe can do a better job keeping our composure at times.\u201d<\/p>\n
Booker finished with 22 points, while Jalen Green had 21 in the loss.<\/p>\n
Game 3 is scheduled for Saturday in Phoenix.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scores 37 as Oklahoma City beat Phoenix Suns\u00a0120-107 in the Western Conference playoff series. Published On…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":716606,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[7,6,11,67,275,417,418],"class_list":{"0":"post-716605","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba-playoffs","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-nba-playoffs","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-sport","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-us-canada"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116454646334505896","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716605","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=716605"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716605\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/716606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=716605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=716605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=716605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}