{"id":507772,"date":"2026-02-27T15:17:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T15:17:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/507772\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T15:17:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T15:17:10","slug":"shai-gilgeous-alexander-cleared-to-return-for-thunder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/507772\/","title":{"rendered":"Shai Gilgeous-Alexander cleared to return for Thunder"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Tim MacMahonFeb 27, 2026, 10:38 AM<\/p>\n

Close<\/a>Joined ESPNDallas.com in September 2009Covers the Dallas Cowboys and Dallas MavericksAppears regularly on ESPN Dallas 103.3 FM<\/p>\n

Multiple Authors<\/p>\n

Reigning NBA MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander<\/a> was cleared to return Thursday after missing the defending champion Oklahoma City Thunder<\/a>‘s past nine games because of an abdominal strain.<\/p>\n

Gilgeous-Alexander, who is not on the official injury report, will be available for Friday’s home game against the Denver Nuggets<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Thunder went 5-4 in Gilgeous-Alexander’s absence after he suffered the injury during a Feb. 3 win over the Orlando Magic<\/a>. Oklahoma City’s lead atop the Western Conference standings has been trimmed to two games over the San Antonio Spurs<\/a>, who have won 10 straight games and own the season tiebreaker between the teams.<\/p>\n

Editor’s Picks<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n

1 Related<\/p>\n

Oklahoma City is still without All-NBA wing Jalen Williams<\/a> and key reserve guard Ajay Mitchell<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Williams, who returned for two games before the All-Star break before aggravating his right hamstring strain, is scheduled to be reevaluated in approximately one week.<\/p>\n

Mitchell has been out since he suffered an abdominal strain Jan. 21. He was on track to return after the All-Star break before spraining his ankle in a workout.<\/p>\n

Gilgeous-Alexander is averaging 31.8 points, 6.4 assists, 4.4 rebounds and 1.3 steals. He is the MVP favorite again with -125 odds to win the award, according to DraftKings Sportsbook.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tim MacMahonFeb 27, 2026, 10:38 AM CloseJoined ESPNDallas.com in September 2009Covers the Dallas Cowboys and Dallas MavericksAppears regularly…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":455719,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-507772","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507772","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=507772"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507772\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/455719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=507772"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=507772"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=507772"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}