Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic and Oklahoma City Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander are getting used to seeing each other in the rare air of NBA history.<\/p>\n
The stars have finished No. 1 and 2 in MVP voting for the past two seasons. Gilgeous-Alexander won in 2024-25 after Jokic earned the third MVP award of his career in 2023-24.<\/p>\n
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Last season, they met in a seven-game Western Conference semifinal series that the Thunder won on their way to the franchise\u2019s first NBA title since moving to Oklahoma City.<\/p>\n
MORE: Notable NBA players with Achilles injury and their time of return<\/a><\/p>\n On Monday night, Jokic and Gilgeous-Alexander clashed in a classic battle that ended with SGA knocking in the game-winner and tying an NBA legend\u2019s 63-year-old record.<\/p>\n Gilgeous-Alexander scored 35 points on 14-of-21 shooting and dished out a career-high 15 assists as the Thunder snagged the 129-126 victory. It was SGA\u2019s 126th consecutive game scoring 20 or more points, tying Wilt Chamberlain\u2019s record set from 1961-63.<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n Not surprisingly, Jokic is already in that club, too. He broke Chamberlain\u2019s record for most triple-doubles by a center. He also is on pace to become the first center to lead the league in assists since Chamberlain did it in 1967-68.<\/p>\n After the game, Jokic shared his thoughts on his rival\u2019s achievement: \u201cI don\u2019t know that people know how hard it is to do that. To make 20 points in 10 (straight) games, not 120 whatever it is, it\u2019s special. He\u2019s a special player,\u201d per NBA reporter Anthony Slater<\/a>.<\/p>\n Jokic turned in another triple-double in Monday\u2019s defeat. He scored 32 points on 12-of-19 shooting with 14 rebounds and 13 assists.<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n As the season enters the home stretch, the Thunder remain atop the Western Conference standings with a 51-15 record, three games ahead of the San Antonio Spurs. Denver holds the sixth spot at 39-26, 1.5 games ahead of the Phoenix Suns.<\/p>\n Gilgeous-Alexander will look to break Chamberlain\u2019s record when the Thunder host the Boston Celtics at 9:30 p.m. ET Thursday.<\/p>\n \u2014 Enjoy free coverage of the top news & trending stories on The Big Lead <\/a>\u2014<\/p>\n NFL: 2026 NFL Free Agency\u2019s biggest Day 1 winners<\/a><\/p>\n WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC: Randy Arozarena slams Cal Raleigh after he refuses to shake hands at WBC<\/a><\/p>\n MARCH MADNESS: 5 potential bracket-busting March Madness 2026 Cinderella teams<\/a><\/p>\n NBA: Adam Silver sends message after cancelling Hawks\u2019 \u2018Magic Monday\u2019 promotion<\/a><\/p>\n PARALYMPICS: 2026 Winter Paralympics medal count standings entering March 10<\/a><\/p>\n VIRAL: Wasserman Agency reveals new name, cancelling disgraced founder<\/a><\/p>\n The post Three-time NBA MVP praises Shai Gilgeous-Alexander for matching 63-year-old Wilt Chamberlain record<\/a> appeared first on The Big Lead<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic and Oklahoma City Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander are getting used to seeing each…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":531362,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,1664,6099,1662,43498,16118,590,3906,5673,5548,7185,5653,10549,12841,85,39792],"class_list":{"0":"post-531361","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-boston-celtics","11":"tag-cal-raleigh","12":"tag-denver-nuggets","13":"tag-gilgeous-alexander","14":"tag-hawks","15":"tag-nba","16":"tag-nikola-jokic","17":"tag-oklahoma-city","18":"tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","19":"tag-phoenix-suns","20":"tag-randy-arozarena","21":"tag-san-antonio-spurs","22":"tag-shai-gilgeous-alexander","23":"tag-sports","24":"tag-wilt-chamberlain"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531361","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=531361"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531361\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/531362"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=531361"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=531361"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=531361"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}