OKLAHOMA City was angry. No, it was very angry. Very, very angry even.
Visibly smarting from a won-game that got away just two days back, the Oklahoma City Thunder poured it all on Sunday (Monday June 9, 2025, PH time) to score an ego-restoring 123-107 rout of the Indiana Pacers at Paycom Center in OKC before another sellout hometown crowd that kept yelling “defense! defense!” when Indiana was in ball possession.
It was Oklahoma thundering practically all the way, not giving Indiana even a semblance of a fight as if making a statement that the Pacers’ Game 1 victory was a fluke.
OKC’s overwhelming win evened the best-of-seven series at 1-1 for the National Basketball Association (NBA) title even as the humbled Pacers resolved to mount their own bounce back when the championship shifts to Indianapolis in the next two games at the famed Gainfield House beginning Wednesday (Thursday, June 12, PH time).
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander spearheaded OKC’s dominant win, asserting himself once again as the season’s Most Valuable Player, tabbing 34 points, eight assists, five rebounds and four assists. He got ample support from the towering Chet Holmgren and Jalen Williams as OKC’s Big 3 delivered without let-up in the win that more than atoned for Shai’s missed mid-range shot, which could have blunted Tyrese Haliburton’s miracle shot that clinched Game 1 for Indiana by a single point.
There was no collapse this time for OKC, which squandered a 15-point lead and allowed Indiana to steal Game 1.
So decisive and calculating was OKC in Game 2 that Indiana coach Rick Carlisle benched Haliburton with still plenty of time left in an uncharacteristic show of surrender for a squad also known as the “48-minute team” for its resilience.
OKC responded by recalling to the bench Gilgeous-Alexander and his fellow starters with 2:42 left, with the Thunder unreachable, 117-99.
“We used the opportunity to get better,” said Gilgeous-Alexander. “Tonight was the same thing.”
It wasn’t the same thing for Haliburton, who transformed from Miracle Man to
Missing Man.
The Game 1 hero had just one field goal in the first half while scoring only three points, ending up with mere five points after three quarters that saw OKC up, 93-74.
Where Haliburton goes, so does Indiana.