OKLAHOMA CITY \u2013 Chet Holmgren attempted two shots in Game 7 of the Western Conference finals. He absorbed plenty of shots from critics afterward.<\/p>\n
And the Oklahoma City Thunder spent Day 1 of the offseason making clear that they support him.<\/p>\n
If the ballyhooed matchup in the West finals was Holmgren vs. San Antonio’s Victor Wembanyama, then it was a one-sided one. Wembanyama had the superior numbers in the series and the Spurs wound up prevailing, while Holmgren was barely a factor offensively with the Thunder season on the line Saturday night.<\/p>\n
“Every minute Chet Holmgren\u2019s been on the team, we\u2019ve been the 1 seed in the Western Conference,” Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said Sunday, when the team gathered for end-of-season meetings. \u201cAnd it wasn\u2019t the case before Chet was healthy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Holmgren had likely his best season, with career-highs of 17.1 points and 8.9 rebounds per game. He made All-NBA for the first time, All-Defensive for the first time as well, got his first All-Star nod, plus was second in the Defensive Player of the Year balloting.<\/p>\n
He finished second in that voting behind Wembanyama \u2014 just like he did for Rookie of the Year in 2024, and just like the Thunder did in these West finals.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need Chet. We need Chet Holmgren,\u201d Thunder guard and back-to-back reigning NBA Most Valuable Player Shai Gilgeous-Alexander said. \u201cBefore Chet was here, we weren\u2019t who we are today. We didn\u2019t have the success we had today. When he\u2019s the best version of himself, we\u2019re the best version of ourselves and it\u2019s no secret.\u201d<\/p>\n
It’s easy to envision the West finals matchup \u2014 Thunder vs. Spurs \u2014 becoming a rivalry for years to come. Both teams have young, obviously highly talented corps, and now they have the ingredient that all rivalries truly need, that being a playoff matchup, to help provide fuel.<\/p>\n
\u201cI definitely think that they\u2019re different in terms of I don\u2019t think there\u2019s another team that has their play style, their personnel,\u201d Holmgren said. \u201cThey’re unique in that way. You can\u2019t just kind of play like a base normal, \u2018this is what we kind of do on an average Tuesday night\u2019 type of thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
And while the outside world might have looked at Holmgren as one of the reasons why Game 7 didn’t go Oklahoma City’s way, the rest of the Thunder disagreed.<\/p>\n
Gilgeous-Alexander, for example, pointed to himself \u2014 and that was after he had a brilliant 35-point effort in the deciding game against San Antonio. He even went as far as to describe a second straight MVP season as \u201ca failure.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI failed at my goal,\u201d Gilgeous-Alexander said. \u201cI didn\u2019t achieve what I wanted to achieve, but through my experiences, I learned the most about myself and I make the greatest amount of increases I have in my career when I fail at my goal and don\u2019t get what I want. And I look at this no different. I didn\u2019t get where I wanted to go this season. There\u2019s a reason for that. Now I have to look at that reason and try to make sure it never happens again.\u201d<\/p>\n
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