![\"Three](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/shai-day-rally.jpg\")
Verbo Dela Cruz, Maddox Abarico and Simon Hanna, left to right, are friends who attended the rally honouring Gilgeous-Alexander. (Aura Carre\u00f1o Rosas\/CBC)In an elite NBA group<\/p>\nNBA superstar Shai Gilgeous-Alexander came home to\u00a0Hamilton on Thursday\u00a0and professed his love for the\u00a0Ontario city\u00a0during a celebration to mark one of the greatest seasons in league\u00a0history.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Hundreds of people\u00a0attended\u00a0the free rally to honour\u00a0the Oklahoma City Thunder point guard as he was presented with a key to the city.<\/p>\n
In the 2024-2025 season, Gilgeous-Alexander, 27, won the NBA championship, was named the finals MVP and\u00a0regular-season MVP, and took the league scoring title.<\/p>\n
“Growing up as I travelled across the world, people always asked me where I was from … I took pride in letting everyone know I was from Hamilton,”\u00a0Gilgeous-Alexander told\u00a0the cheering crowd.<\/p>\n
“I liked telling them what Steel City meant to me. Hamiltonians carry a different sense of grit, determination and pride and energy than the rest of the province. And honestly, I couldn’t shy away from that.\u00a0I carry that with me every day.”\u00a0<\/p>\n
Verbo Dela Cruz, Maddox Abarico and Simon Hanna, left to right, are friends who attended the rally honouring Gilgeous-Alexander. (Aura Carre\u00f1o Rosas\/CBC)In an elite NBA group<\/p>\n
The only other players who have managed the same\u00a0feat as Gilgeous-Alexander in\u00a0one NBA season are\u00a0Shaquille O’Neal, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar\u00a0and\u00a0Michael Jordan, who did it four times. That’s all. Just Gilgeous-Alexander and three NBA Hall of Famers. No Lebron. No Kobe.\u00a0No Steph Curry.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Many athletes would be considered a great player having had achieved\u00a0just one of these accolades,”\u00a0Rowan Barrett, general manager of the Canadian men’s national team, said at the rally. “But to do them all with such grace, calmness under pressure and true leadership in every sense of the word \u2014 it was a beautiful thing to behold.”<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/usa-sport.JPG\")
Gilgeous-Alexander gestures to the crowd as Oklahoma City celebrates its first NBA Finals title with a champions parade throughout downtown on June 24. (Bryan Terry\/USA TODAY NETWORK\/Imagn Images\/Reuters)<\/p>\n
Mayor Andrea Horwath gave Gilgeous-Alexander the first key to the city to be presented by a Hamilton mayor since 1998, and it’s the city’s\u00a0highest honour, she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Shai, you’ve not just inspired Hamilton, not just Canada,\u00a0but\u00a0fans around the world. And you’ve done it with humility, with heart and an unwavering connection to the city you call home,” said Horwath. “On behalf of all Hamiltonians, we could not be more proud.”\u00a0<\/p>\n
The last recipient of the key to the city was professional wrestler Stone Cold Steve Austin. It was presented by\u00a0Bob Morrow, the mayor at the time, in September 1998.<\/p>\n
Gilgeous-Alexander said he felt “overwhelming joy” when he found out he was getting a key to the city.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He went to high school at St. Thomas More\u00a0and Sir Allan MacNab, both on the Mountain, and was drafted into the NBA in 2018 after playing one year of college basketball in the U.S.<\/p>\n
‘He’s putting us on the map’<\/p>\n
Verbo Dela Cruz, 20, was at the rally early to get a good spot to see his idol,\u00a0Gilgeous-Alexander.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“He’s putting us on the map \u2014 not just Toronto. It’s Hamilton now too,” said\u00a0Dela Cruz.<\/p>\n
![\"Six-year-old](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/frankie-kelly-and-her-mother-melanie-inrig-at-hamilton-event-honouring-shai-gilgeous-alexander.jpg\")
Six-year-old Frankie Kelly and her mom, Melanie Inrig, were at the rally with a larger-than life Gilgeous-Alexander sign. (Aura Carre\u00f1o Rosas\/CBC)<\/p>\n
“He’s a huge inspiration,” added his friend, Maddox Abarico, 21.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A lifelong Hamiltonian, Pam Edgecomb, 75, said being at the rally and seeing Gilgeous-Alexander in person felt surreal.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Shai, we admire him so much, as an athlete, a human being, a role model, for all ages,” she said. “He’s unbelievable. It’s just unbelievable it really is.”\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NBA superstar Shai Gilgeous-Alexander came home to\u00a0Hamilton on Thursday\u00a0and professed his love for the\u00a0Ontario city\u00a0during a celebration to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52999,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[49,48,459,82],"class_list":["post-52998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}