The Oklahoma City Thunder’s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 40 points in the first 3 quarters en route to a victory over the Cleveland Cavaliers in a matchup between the league’s two best teams. Dave DuFour and Zena Keita breakdown the Thunder win, Shai’s MVP performance, and discuss the new Unrivaled basketball league and the potential ramifications for the NBA. Then, the Athletic’s Joe Vardon joins the show from Oklahoma City with the Cavs’ perspective on their loss, why they struggle against perimeter size, and who they are targeting on the trade market.Host: Dave DuFourWith: Zena Keita & Joe VardonExecutive Producer: Andrew SchlechtAudio Producer: Grayson MoodySubmit your questions to The Athletic NBA Daily mailbag: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5939460/2024/11/25/nba-podcast-mailbag-athletic-daily/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Chapter 1: What happened in the Thunder vs. Cavs game?
Good morning and welcome to the NBA Daily for January 17th, 2025. Coming up, we got Thunder Cavs 2. Not as good as the first one. Not at all. Oh, man. We got the unrivaled league for women's basketball and Zena is going to tell us all about that. And we have Joe Varden to tell us about the Cavs side of their embarrassing loss to the Thunder. Good morning, everybody. Good morning, Zena.
Man, I really I hate to be so disappointed about a sequel, but Cavs Thunder 2 just did not live up to the billing. The first first game was game of the year. Second one was the worst game of the Cavs season by a long shot. So we're going to get to the Cavs side of that after our little break with Joe Varden, because he's in the arena and, you know, he's the voice of the Cavs for us.
So, Zena, I got to talk about the Thunder. They are something else. They just tied the Cleveland Cavaliers by winning the game last night. In convincing fashion. They tied them for the best record in the league. They're now 34-6. Shea Gildas Alexander puts up 40 in 30 minutes. They're the best team in basketball.
Chapter 2: Who stood out in the Thunder's victory?
Yeah, and OKC deserves all of the esteem. Their play tonight was not only... dominant, it was good. It's the type of game tape that you show young kids on how you should play defense, how you should play in transition, how you should play as a team. And they officially put the Cavs in a position to prove that their win over OKC just a week ago was not a fluke. They have depth.
I mean, you saw Brandon Carlson, some undrafted rookie out of Utah, come in in the Give some buckets. You saw OKC have legendary buy-in into their defense, into playing fast and responsible. They made the Cavs have to force threes up. This is the Cavs that have played an inside-out game all year long, and they made them look like they couldn't... Couldn't win shell defense drills in practice.
Like, it was tough for the Cavs to be able to find buckets inside. And OKC, good on them for showing up in this game and getting that revenge win.
Yeah, OKC created 21 turnovers. And we keep saying, I stole this from Andrew Schleck, that this is the most disruptive defense in NBA history. And, I mean, they did that to the Cavs, who are pretty good at protecting the basketball. Shea Gildas Alexander, in my opinion, All he has to do is maintain pace here. I think he wrapped up the MVP with this performance. Again, it's on national TV.
This stuff matters quite a bit. And to put up 40 and three quarters, that's a dominance that we think about when Steph Curry was doing this in his unanimous season where he was unanimous MVP. This is the stuff that stands out when you're going to vote come May.
Absolutely. There's a really cool account on X, OKC Thunder stats, and they do these like random assessments of stats that OKC, current OKC Thunder have in comparison to former players. As of last night's game against the Cavs, Shea Gildas Alexander now has more 30 point performances in his career. than Paul George.
And we just took time a few weeks ago to talk to Marcus Thompson about games we like to watch, right? Games that mesmerize you. And when you have a Shea Goldis Alexander performing in this way amidst the team performance that is OKC, and he still stands out, that shows you just how much of an impact that he makes offensively and how much his game...
is different than anything else we're seeing in the league yes i think he absolutely is mvp and if anything he is now sitting in a seat where someone has to come and take it from him as opposed to him having to fight for it from someone else yeah and the thunder have such a big lead in the west that at this point it looks like they're going to be the one seed by the way i didn't even mention
They didn't have Hartenstein for this game, right? So no Isaiah Hartenstein. This is a team that has not been healthy all year. They were down. They're starting big man. Of course, Chet Holmgren not out there. And they're playing a team that has two high-quality bigs in Evan Mobley and Jared Allen. And it didn't really matter for them.
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Chapter 3: What are the implications of the new Unrivaled league?
I mean, look, there's a real difference, I think, with NBA players doing something like this and the W. And it's not just...
you know does it does it make sense financially everyone of course is they would make money on it somehow but from for me i think that you would take away they would take away from the nba because part of what the nba has is these guys and if they're out doing their own thing the nba is not gonna be happy about it but we already see these guys all the time so i don't know that the nba guys can pull it off in the same way but i'm excited to see what what the ladies do and again
Stay in the States and play basketball, and especially during basketball season, I think it'll help them out. What do you think the outcome of this is? Is this like a one-off, or is this going to be just a co-league that runs during the offseason from here on out?
Well, it definitely won't be a one-off. I mean, they already signed a multi-year marquee media rights deal with TNT Sports. So if TNT is expecting it to work for more than one year, it's definitely going to be in the works. But again, with them, you hit it on the nail, like why this won't work as smoothly, in my opinion and yours, for the NBA. The NBA takes up all the time.
They've got 82 games, right? Whereas TNT,
the wmba is it's 40. so it's like it's not as many games they do need time to fill uh in that off season and so it's going to work a little bit more differently there and again the the leaders of this this organization nafisa collier brianna stewart alex bezell which is collier's husband and luke cooper the president of basketball operations they've all said they want this to be additive
to the WNBA. And by the way, I almost forgot. Definitely tune into the podcast. But if you're on the site, Sabrina Merchant has written about this extensively. Ben Pickman as well. They have covered this. They're going to be covering this league really well in the written form. So definitely tap in for that. Absolutely.
We have the best women's basketball coverage that you can find anywhere. Also, Mark Schindler's back doing bracketology. So go and check that out here soon, too. Guys, stick around after the break. We got Joe Varden to tell us why the Cavs are sad.
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Chapter 4: How does the Cavs' performance impact their trade targets?
Chapter 5: What makes Shea Gildas Alexander an MVP candidate?
Absolutely. There's a really cool account on X, OKC Thunder stats, and they do these like random assessments of stats that OKC, current OKC Thunder have in comparison to former players. As of last night's game against the Cavs, Shea Gildas Alexander now has more 30 point performances in his career. than Paul George.
And we just took time a few weeks ago to talk to Marcus Thompson about games we like to watch, right? Games that mesmerize you. And when you have a Shea Goldis Alexander performing in this way amidst the team performance that is OKC, and he still stands out, that shows you just how much of an impact that he makes offensively and how much his game...
is different than anything else we're seeing in the league yes i think he absolutely is mvp and if anything he is now sitting in a seat where someone has to come and take it from him as opposed to him having to fight for it from someone else yeah and the thunder have such a big lead in the west that at this point it looks like they're going to be the one seed by the way i didn't even mention
They didn't have Hartenstein for this game, right? So no Isaiah Hartenstein. This is a team that has not been healthy all year. They were down. They're starting big man. Of course, Chet Holmgren not out there. And they're playing a team that has two high-quality bigs in Evan Mobley and Jared Allen. And it didn't really matter for them.
And I think a big part of that is Jalen Williams because his ability to kind of play up. I mean, he had a foul very early in this game, and you start thinking, oh, could be a long night around the basket. But, I mean, they were excellent.
Jalen puts up 19, has six rebounds, five assists, three steals, two blocks, continues to kind of be this – it's not a Swiss Army knife because he's more like a Leatherman, right? It's like an adult Swiss Army knife that actually has real tools. I mean, he's putting up not only, I think, a strong case for all-star. This might be a guy when you start –
When all this stuff starts shaking out in awards season and you start looking at the guys who qualify because of the 65 game rule, I mean, it's not out of the question that Jalen Williams might be an all-NBA guy, not just an all-star.
I agree with you. First of all, Dave, were you a Boy Scout pulling out Leatherman? I mean, no, but they wish.
Those guys aren't hardcore enough for me.
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Chapter 6: How does Jalen Williams contribute to the Thunder?
facials that they can get. They have unbelievable gym and conditioning workouts and all these different things and access to all these resources that they don't typically have in the off season or have to pay an egregious amount of money to be able to do that. So they've done a really great job of launching something that is attractive for WNBA players. They have a star studded roster.
So people are going to want to tune in. This is the best of the best in the WNBA going up against each other. And you're going to see everyone get reps. It's only three people on a court. So they're going up and down. There's going to be great conditioning. A lot of one-on-one skill work is going to happen.
And a really cool thing about this league, the players also get equity in this league, which is not something they see in the WNBA. Unrivaled overall hopes to be something that is additive overall. to the WNBA. The people behind it are all player development folks, people that really focus on getting the players better.
So they want to see it as the WNBA leans on them to get players in better positions.
Well, part of the reason why this is so relevant beyond the fact that it actually starts tonight is that we heard today or yesterday that Maverick Carter, whose business partners with LeBron James and LeBron are looking for a $5 billion investment in some
international league that they would like to start with some sort of a barnstorming league which again looks like a little bit of a copy of unrivaled but seems like they want to tour the world in a model similar to like formula one now to me i don't think that this works the same for the guys because number one they have an overexposure problem as it is the nba plays 82 games we can't even get these guys i mean we had to set a rule
Of 65 games, just to get these guys to participate a little bit more. And they have an effort issue in their sport, which the WNBA does not. Every regular season WNBA game feels like it matters when you're watching. They play hard the whole time. I did not... All summer long, I watched WNBA every Sunday, and I didn't see anyone taking plays off.
I mean, look, there's a real difference, I think, with NBA players doing something like this and the W. And it's not just...
you know does it does it make sense financially everyone of course is they would make money on it somehow but from for me i think that you would take away they would take away from the nba because part of what the nba has is these guys and if they're out doing their own thing the nba is not gonna be happy about it but we already see these guys all the time so i don't know that the nba guys can pull it off in the same way but i'm excited to see what what the ladies do and again
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Chapter 7: What are the differences between the WNBA and NBA's offseason leagues?
Chapter 8: Will the Unrivaled league affect the WNBA?
To me, eye-opening just how easy of a time the Thunder and especially Shea Gildress Alexander had getting into the paint and putting pressure on the rim. You know, what do they do about that going forward?
Yeah, you know, they've been, the Cavs were ninth, I think, in defense. And Darius has, you know, Kenny reiterated again before today's game that they are not hiding him the way past Cavs teams used to do that. Like Darius takes on the matchup. He's not going to guard Shea. The Cavs are going to put either a Coro or they use Dean. You didn't see that much of Mowgli there. Maybe you should have.
But yeah, I mean, point of attack is that that's another concern. You know, Darius told me tonight that he's 25 pounds heavier than he was last year. So that's a good thing. Yeah, that's a good thing that Well, yeah, I mean, and Donovan is thick, too. So strength wise, you feel like they should be better at the point of attack at the point of attack.
But, you know, Shea Gilgis-Alexander is a bona fide perennial MVP candidate who's averaging like 32 a game or whatever it is. And there's just going to be nights where you're not going to stop him. And tonight was one of those nights like he just was gliding to the rim. And it helps when the Thunder knocked down threes. I think they had 18 threes tonight.
You know, so it was just a recipe for disaster. Kenny called it an avalanche. And that's what it was.
It's interesting. We talk about being able to get into the paint. They were actually even in paint points, which was surprising. And yeah, the final score, 134-114. But it makes you think, okay, even in paint points, not ridiculously out-rebounded. There was a differential with three-pointers particularly, them not being able to get theirs off as much and also not being great at the line. But...
I'm now wondering if you're throwing away the box score and you're looking to the rest of the season, how do you bounce back from this game? How do you make this game look insignificant in the grand scheme of the season to say this was a fluke rather than looking at last week's win against OKC as the fluke?
Yeah, I mean, that's a great point. It's a great question. You know, this is, as I mentioned earlier, they've lost two out of three earlier this year. Those two losses to the Hawks were back to back. So they've been in a situation like this before and bounced back before. The way you do it is you go into Minneapolis on Saturday night.
I mean, you know, things aren't working out like the Timberwolves had planned, but they're still a very dangerous team. They're at home. And, you know, this is a way for the Cavs to finish off what we knew would be a tough road trip and we knew would be a dangerous week. It's proven to be that. But you can set yourself back on a much better path just by winning Saturday.
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