Shai Gilgeous-Alexander\u2019s remarkable streak of 20-plus point games ends at 141 as he scores 17 points in a win over the Denver Nuggets.<\/p>\n
OKLAHOMA CITY \u2014 The most impressive streak of the night involving the Thunder wasn\u2019t beating a strong rival and contender for the second straight game to open the season. It was the other streak, the one that didn\u2019t survive the night.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander failed to get 20 points in a game. Those words haven\u2019t been typed or spoken in almost two years, before his two Kia MVP awards, his NBA Finals MVP and the Thunder\u2019s first championship.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Yes, plenty has happened, mostly good, involving Shai over the course of his NBA record for consecutive 20-point games. It halts at 141, all because of his uncharacteristic mild night against the Denver Nuggets when he came up three points short.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Yet the night could be described as bittersweet, because Shai and the Thunder enjoyed a romp despite a quiet night for him. That speaks loudly about OKC\u2019s defense and the ability of his teammates to cover for him.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Here are the takeaways from OKC\u2019s breezy 12-point win<\/a>:\u00a0<\/p>\n 1. Freaky end to the streak<\/p>\n It began on Nov. 1, 2024, in the fifth game of that season, and like most streaks, the beginning was inconspicuous. Shai dropped 30 points in Portland against the Trail Blazers, and half the country yawned and went to sleep.<\/p>\n Over the next 141 games, though, the accomplishment began to swell in amazement. Consider that Shai couldn\u2019t afford to have an off-night. Meaning, he could score 19 points \u2014 a solid output for most players \u2014 but that would be shy of the standard he set for himself.\u00a0<\/p>\n He broke Wilt Chamberlain\u2019s record along the way and kept going, until the last few minutes remaining on Oct. 22, 2026, almost two full years later.\u00a0<\/p>\n And make no mistake, Shai wanted 142 games. He was re-inserted in a contest in which the Thunder were comfortably ahead with just under seven minutes left, with him stuck on seven points. Last season for example, Shai was on the bench for good in such situations, although by then he already had his 20 for the night.\u00a0<\/p>\n His teammates made a big effort to get him the ball, but with the clock ticking away and guarded tightly by Christian Braun, everyone knew, even after Shai drilled a 25-footer to his 17th point with 1:43 left.\u00a0<\/p>\n Rather than turn the remaining game into a sideshow, Shai checked out and stayed on the bench.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cHe asked out at the end,\u201d said Thunder coach Mark Daigneault. \u201cThat was his substitution \u2026 of all the things I admire about him, that\u2019s toward the top of the list. It shows tremendous class as a competitor.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Shai said: \u201cI think you always treat the game with respect.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Shai had no field goals in the first half and just two points on seven shots, his lowest first half since his first season in OKC in 2019.\u00a0<\/p>\n 2. That\u2019s two for OKC, for starters<\/p>\n Chet Holmgren joins Ernie Johnson to discuss his double-double in the Thunder’s home win over Denver.<\/p>\n The drama surrounding the 20-point streak managed to suffocate OKC\u2019s second win to start the season. Yes, the Thunder are 2-0 but it feels double that, given the circumstances.<\/p>\n They beat Victor Wembanyama and Nikola Joki\u0107. They swatted away the Spurs and Nuggets, perhaps their two biggest threats in the Western Conference, and they did so with room to spare.\u00a0<\/p>\n The first two games of the season could not have gone better for OKC, then. And they did so while Jalen Williams is still ramping up from an injury-ravaged 2025-26 season, and after losing three key rotational players in the offseason to trades.\u00a0<\/p>\n While the Spurs are the rising threat to OKC, the Nuggets represented the initial hurdle for the Thunder. OKC beat the Nuggets three times in four meetings after Denver\u2019s 2023 championship, which served as a changing of the guard in the West, especially when the Thunder won Game 7 in the conference semifinals in 2025 en route to winning the NBA championship.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI remember back when we were in the throes of rebuilding, they were champions,\u201d said Daigneault. \u201cSo you had to be sharp against them on both ends in order to beat them. That raises the bar. It\u2019s how you get better. You get better by competing against one of the best teams.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s no team I have a higher respect for \u2026 they\u2019re a privilege to compete against. They made us better and we\u2019ve competed against each other a lot.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n 3. Size still matters<\/p>\n The benefit for the Thunder of opening against Wemby and Joki\u0107 is seeing how their three 7-footers would dare against perhaps the two best centers in basketball. So far, so good for OKC.<\/p>\n After holding Wemby to 1-for-13 shooting in the season opener, the Thunder kept Joki\u0107 quiet. Jokic shot 5-for-19, and do the math \u2014 6-for-32 for those two centers in consecutive games.\u00a0<\/p>\n The Thunder offer so much in variety with Chet Holmgren, Isaiah Hartenstein and Aday Mara, bringing size, athleticism and power. In addition, the Thunder also tested Joki\u0107 with Jaylin Williams and Alex Caruso for short spells.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhen you have those bigs, there\u2019s a lot you can do that others can\u2019t do,\u201d said Nuggets coach David Adelman.\u00a0<\/p>\n 4. Nuggets seek support<\/p>\n Almost immediately after the Nuggets\u2019 2023 championship, the challenge was to keep quality help around their three-time MVP and two crucial core players, Jamal Murray and Aaron Gordon, to remain in the hunt for future titles. And now, three-plus seasons later, it\u2019s questionable whether the Nuggets are achieving that goal.<\/p>\n Their season opener Thursday seemed inconclusive at best. On a night when Joki\u0107 and Murray were less than optimal offensively \u2014 they shot a combined 7-for-30 \u2014 the Nuggets lacked that step-up player even though their bench outscored OKC\u2019s by 33-31.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cSo many new faces,\u201d said Adelman. \u201cThe identity will work itself out. We\u2019re two different teams from last year to this year.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n While the Nuggets added DeMar DeRozan, there will be microscopic focus on Braun and Cam Johnson, in particular. Both need a bounceback season after faltering in 2025-26. They combined for 12 points Thursday, in a game that begged for someone other than Gordon to generate against OKC\u2019s solid defense.\u00a0<\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n Shaun Powell has covered the NBA since 1985. You can e-mail him at\u00a0spowell@nba.com<\/a>, find\u00a0his archive here<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0follow him on\u00a0X<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Shai Gilgeous-Alexander\u2019s remarkable streak of 20-plus point games ends at 141 as he scores 17 points in a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":943216,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[49,48,459,322876,322875,82],"class_list":["post-943215","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nba","tag-nuggets-thunder-analysis","tag-nuggets-thunder-takeaways","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943215","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=943215"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943215\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/943216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=943215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=943215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=943215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}