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Former Kentucky guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, this year’s NBA most valuable player, now can add NBA champion to his resume after the Oklahoma City Thunder beat the Indiana Pacers 103-91 in Game 7 when Gilgeous-Alexander had 12 assists to go with 29 points.
Gilgeous-Alexander joins Shaquille O’Neal (Lakers), Michael Jordan (Bulls) and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (Bucks) as the only players to be NBA MVP, regular season scoring leader, on the team with the league’s best regular-season record, win an NBA title and be named NBA Finals MVP in the same season.
Here is part of what Gilgeous-Alexander had to say after Sunday’s Game 7 win:
Q. Shai, you’ve been a champion for about 45 minutes. Does it feel as good as you thought it would feel?
SHAI GILGEOUS-ALEXANDER: Yeah, feels amazing. So much weight off my shoulders. So much stress relieved. No matter what, you go into every night wanting to win. Sometimes it just doesn’t go your way. Tonight could have been one of those nights where we found a way. So proud of this group. Wouldn’t want to do it with any other group in the world. Feels good to be a champion.
Q. You have some of the most unassuming leaders at the top. What is it like to be led by those guys?
SHAI GILGEOUS-ALEXANDER: Yeah, I’m so happy for them. They put in so much work behind the scenes, that not everybody sees. Don’t always get the credit. They’ve done an amazing job of building an environment, a winning environment. It’s no fluke why we’re here and why we have so much success and why we’ve grown so quickly. Those guys have done a great job of just giving us a platform to be ourselves and be great, and we did so.
Q. Shai, it’s a real shortlist of guys who have won MVP and Finals MVP in the same season. Scoring title. Now that you have crossed the finish line, are you able to wrap your head around that historic company that you’ve joined?
SHAI GILGEOUS-ALEXANDER: Yeah, it’s hard to believe that I’m part of that group. It’s hard to even fathom that I’m that type of basketball player sometimes. As a kid, you dream. Every kid dreams. But you don’t ever really know if it’s going to come true. I’m just glad and happy that my dreams have been able to come true. That’s a “thank you” to everyone that’s been in my corner that helped me get there. Wouldn’t have been able to get here without them. They know who they are. Yeah, it’s a win for the family.
Q. You had so many big moments throughout the series. Where does your late-game composure come from? Is that something you felt like happened when you were younger or when you were older?
SHAI GILGEOUS-ALEXANDER: Yeah, it’s something that I definitely got as I’ve gotten older. Coaches worked with me on that a lot over the past three, three or four years, just as the group has continued to grow. Something that I still can be better at. But yeah, it’s an emphasis of mine. Those are the minutes, those are the moments when the best players, the biggest stars, the superstars, Hall of Fame players, make their name. I want to have that name, I want to have those titles attached to my name. Those moments are very important to me and I try to excel at them, for sure.
Q. You’re only 20 minutes removed from winning, but has the realization hit you yet that you guys might be here for a while, competing for a few of these things?
SHAI GILGEOUS-ALEXANDER: Yeah, like you said, I haven’t even thought that far ahead. But yeah, we definitely still have room to grow. That’s the fun part of this. So many of us can still get better. There’s not very many of us on the team that are ‘in our prime’ or even close to it. We have a lot to grow, individually and as a group. I’m excited for the future of this team. This is a great start, for sure. I’m really excited for this team. Couldn’t have imagined it any other way.
Q. You talk about the history that you personally made. The team also had an historic season. How much pride, what stock do you put in not just the championship but the way you played all season?
SHAI GILGEOUS-ALEXANDER: Yeah, it was impressive. But I think the most impressive part is, like, the group that did it. Our togetherness on and off the court, like how much fun we have, it made it so much easier. It made it feel like we were just kids playing basketball. It was so fun. All the achievements and accolades and things, like, they don’t even come close to the satisfaction of winning with your brothers and people that you are so close to and want to succeed just as much as you want yourself to succeed. That’s been the most impressive and fun part of it, just to know that I have 15 brothers that I just experienced a once-in-a-lifetime experience with. I’ll never forget them, they’ll never forget me.
Q. You’ve mentioned how much fatherhood means to you. When your little one gets older, what will you tell them about the sacrifices it takes to reach such heights?
SHAI GILGEOUS-ALEXANDER: You’re going to have to sacrifice. But ultimately it’s your choice, it’s your life. If you want something, go get it. You can, if you want it. It’s that simple. You might not always get the results you want, but all you can control is going after it and giving it your all and see where that takes you. That’s all I did.
Q. What does it mean, how much sweeter does it make it to get through all the adversity and be in it for the long haul?
SHAI GILGEOUS-ALEXANDER: Feels great. Just goes to show, like, when you prioritize the right things, when you have good intentions, good people around you, anything’s possible. Throughout this whole process, Sam has done a really good job of just, like, being honest and upfront, not only myself but the rest of the group. Two years, three years ago, he came into the room and said, I think this is just when Chet got hurt in the summertime, he was like, all the noises that we’re going to take again because Chet got hurt. He said, our destiny is what we make it, no one else can control that.
That message stuck with me ever since that. We can do whatever we want to do out there. Just like how we’ve all got to the NBA, no matter what anybody says, who is hurt or who is not. I think that talk stuck in my head, I think a few of the other guys as well. It’s a big part of why we’re here.
Q. You had 12 assists , your Playoff career high. How much pride do you take in that? How important do you think that was?
SHAI GILGEOUS-ALEXANDER: Yeah, coming off of Game 6, I obviously had a lot more turnovers than assists. That’s not a recipe for a win. I wanted to do whatever it took tonight to get a win. Whether that was me playing in space or it was them not letting me play in space, some of my teammates are open, just trying to make the right basketball play. Just do whatever it takes to win at the end of the night. I got enough done.
One Response
I know SGA doesn’t mean anything by it, but claiming that playing a game for millions and millions of dollars is stressful is a slap in the face to those who are really facing stress. When Shaq said that, his dad took him to meet some people that were really living a stressed life. Their home had just burned and the father had just lost his job. Shaq’s dad said he needed a big dose of the real world. Shaq said he never stressed over the game again.
When pro athletes talk about being stressed, it is almost always self induced and what they are stressing about doesn’t amount to a hill of beans in real life. They need to shut up about being stressed.
My wife works with a man that was very high up in Special Forces. He said you don’t know stress until your decisions decide who walks home and who is carried home in a body bag.