This has been Oklahoma Metropolis’s formulation all season: Lose one recreation, reply within the subsequent.
That is precisely what the Thunder did in Recreation 2 of the NBA Finals.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 34 factors, Alex Caruso added 20 off the bench and the Thunder beat the Indiana Pacers 123-107 on Sunday night time to tie these Finals at one recreation apiece.
Jalen Williams scored 19, Aaron Wiggins had 18 and Chet Holmgren completed with 15 for the Thunder. It was the franchise’s first Finals recreation win for the reason that opener of the 2012 collection in opposition to Miami.
“We did some issues good tonight. We did some issues dangerous,” Gilgeous-Alexander stated. “We have to have the ability to get higher and be prepared for Recreation 3.”
Tyrese Haliburton scored 17 for Indiana, which erased a 15-point, fourth-quarter deficit in Recreation 1 however by no means made a push on Sunday. Myles Turner scored 16 and Pascal Siakam added 15 for the Pacers, the primary workforce since Miami in 2013 to not have a 20-point scorer within the first two video games of the Finals.
Recreation 3 is Wednesday at Indianapolis, in what would be the first Finals recreation in that metropolis in 25 years.
Gilgeous-Alexander’s first basket of the night time was a historical past maker: It gave him 3,000 factors on the season, together with the common season and playoffs. And later in Recreation 2, he handed New York’s Jalen Brunson (514) because the main general scorer in these playoffs.
However the true milestone for the MVP got here a few hours later, when he and most all people else on the Thunder obtained a Finals win for the primary time.
A 19-2 run within the second quarter turned what was a six-point recreation right into a 23-point Thunder lead. It might need appeared wobbly a few instances — an instantaneous 10-0 rebuttal by the Pacers made it 52-39, and Indiana was inside 13 once more after Andrew Nembhard’s layup with 7:09 left within the third — however the Thunder’s lead was by no means in critical doubt.
With the noise degree within the constructing typically topping 100 decibels — a chainsaw is 110 dB, for comparability functions — the Thunder did what they’ve executed just about all season. They got here off a loss, this time a 111-110 defeat in Recreation 1, and blew any person out as their response.
Together with the NBA Cup title recreation, which does not rely in any standings, the Thunder are actually 18-2 this season when coming off a loss. Of these 18 wins, 12 have been by double digits.
