With eight minutes and 30 seconds left in the fourth quarter of Game 5 of the NBA Finals, the Oklahoma City Thunder were reeling.
Once leading by as many as 18 points, the Thunder’s lead had been cut to 2. In what was shaping up to be a repeat of Game 1, Oklahoma City appeared to be in danger of blowing a double-digit lead to the premier comeback artists of the playoffs, the Indiana Pacers.
Only this time, Thunder forward Jalen Williams stood in the way.
After the Pacers cut the score to 95-93, the Thunder went on a 16-4 run over the next two minutes and 55 seconds, pushing their lead to 14 before winning 120-109. And during that decisive stretch, Williams scored 8 of his team-leading 11 fourth-quarter points, keeping Indiana at bay and leading the Thunder to within one win of a championship.
“Great force,” Oklahoma City coach Mark Daigneault said when asked to describe what he saw from Williams in Game 5. “That was an unbelievable performance by him, just throughout the whole game. He really was on the gas the entire night. Applied a ton of pressure.”
“He was, like, really gutsy tonight,” said Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the regular season MVP. “He stepped into big plays. Felt like every time we needed a shot, he made it. He wasn’t afraid. He was fearless tonight.”
Williams finished with a playoff career-high 40 points, along with six rebounds and four assists. He shot 14-of-25 from the field, including 3-of-5 from deep. Only 24 years old, Williams became the fifth-youngest player to score at least 40 points in an NBA Finals game, and it couldn’t have come at a more crucial moment for the Thunder.
“A lot of the things that [Williams] got in the game tonight are things we talked about earlier in the season,” Daigneault said. “He wasn’t having games like this in November, December. His focus on the improvement led him to being the player he is right now.”
“In order to get better and being good in these moments — and by no means am I perfect in these moments — you’re able to generate good habits when you have the right way of going about it and you have a process,” Williams said. “I’m extremely fortunate that I have a coach and a staff and teammates that allow me to have those ugly plays during the year and figure out my game.”
Oklahoma City needed Williams to improve not only from earlier in the season, but from earlier in the playoffs as well. While on the whole his postseason has impressed, Williams has had some struggles in big moments.
In a Game 1 loss to the Denver Nuggets in the second round, Williams scored only 16 points on 5-of-20 shooting. Later that series, in a Game 6 defeat, he shot 3-of-16 for only 6 points.
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Through the first two games of the finals, Williams was averaging only 18 points on 33.3% shooting — but he finally broke out with 26 in Game 3. Since then, his improvement seems to have crystallized.
Over the last two games, Williams has been asked to handle the ball more in the wake of full-court pressure on Gilgeous-Alexander, and he’s responded with his two best scoring games of the championship round, dropping 27 last Friday before his 40-piece on Monday.
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The Game 5 performance, especially, is not one Williams expected so soon in his career.
“To understand the opportunity that we have I just try to play as hard as I can,” he said. “Whatever happens after that is where the chips fall.
“But I’d be lying if I said I could imagine doing what I did tonight. I definitely could have seen myself here a long time ago, I just didn’t think it would happen this fast and I didn’t think it would be with a group of guys that I truly am grateful to be around.”
On Monday, the Thunder were grateful for him.
