The Oklahoma City Thunder are in cruise control at the moment; they are in the middle of an 11-game winning streak, with seven of those wins coming in blowout fashion. They have the best record in the NBA and have looked like every bit of the contending team that every critic and fan had them as entering the season.
The Thunder’s excellence goes beyond that of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s. They hang their hat on defense, and they force turnovers at such an incredible rate. To top it all off, they patched up their biggest weakness last season (rebounding) with the addition of Isaiah Hartenstein and bolstered what was already an impressive defensive core with the addition of Alex Caruso. In turn, they have posted the league’s best defense this season (in terms of points allowed per 100 possessions), allowing three fewer points per 100 than the second-ranked team in the association.
OKC has all the makings of a championship team. They have an unstoppable force leading their offense, willing defenders who will sacrifice their body for the greater good of the team, and a head coach willing to make adjustments at any time. But playoff success, as many would say, still hinges on matchups.
While the Thunder should be the favorite in every playoff series they’re going to be in, especially when they’re on track for homecourt advantage throughout the entirety of the playoffs, there still might be a matchup or two that they would much rather avoid.
With that said, here is the dream scenario that the Thunder would want to face and nightmare circumstance that they would want to avoid heading into the 2025 NBA playoffs.
Dream scenario: Thunder face one of the Kings/Mavericks/Suns in the first round
As was established earlier, the Thunder should be the favorite in any playoff series they find themselves in. That’s how good they’ve been throughout the course of the 2024-25 season. But some matchups are easier than others, and if they somehow find themselves in a first-round clash against one a nine or 10-seed in the conference, then that would allow them to breathe even easier.
This is not to say that there is no upset potential should the Thunder face one of the Sacramento Kings, Dallas Mavericks, or Phoenix Suns in the first round. But it’s hard to envision any scenario other than OKC coming out on top in such a series.
For one, the Thunder’s defense should overwhelm all of those teams; those three teams also don’t have much in the way of stopping OKC’s arsenal of weapons. The closest any of those teams has to someone who can slow down Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is Keon Ellis from the Kings, but even then, in a seven-game series, OKC simply has too much two-way excellence for any of those teams to pose much of a challenge.
Some may argue that a difficult first-round matchup could serve the Thunder better. After all, they had an easy first-round matchup last season, sweeping the New Orleans Pelicans, which may have cooled them off in preparation for their second-round clash against the Mavericks, which they lost. Either way, preserving health is crucial come playoff time, and the easier the matchup is, the more time they can give their important players valuable time to rest.
Now, it’s unlikely that one of those teams (all of which have a sub-.500 record, by the way) overcome whichever team loses the 7/8 play-in tournament matchup. But if that somehow happens, then the Thunder will be smiling from ear to ear. The key of course is to not take any team lightly, but this Thunder squad is well-coached and will be locked in as they look to redeem themselves from the sting of last season’s playoff exit.
Nightmare scenario: Thunder face the Timberwolves in the first round, have to deal with one of the Lakers/Warriors in the second round
Considering how excellent this Thunder team is, there is no such thing as a straight-up nightmare scenario for them in terms of seeding and matchups. The absolute nightmare scenario for them is an injury to one of their key guys (knock on wood), but again, any team that they face should be scared of them, not the other way around. Basically, OKC is any other playoff team’s nightmare scenario.
But in this thought exercise, the hardest (plausible) road for the Thunder on their quest to winning an NBA championship is to face the Minnesota Timberwolves in the first round of the playoffs and already having to deal with one of the Los Angeles Lakers or Golden State Warriors in the second round.
The Timberwolves may not be the team they were last season, but they have given OKC some fits this year; they have the size to muck things up for OKC, the perimeter defense to make things difficult for Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and company, as well as a true superstar in Anthony Edwards that they have to deal with. Minnesota has taken two games from OKC this year; meanwhile, the Los Angeles Clippers, a team that OKC could realistically face in the first round, have taken none.
If the Thunder defeat the Timberwolves, a matchup against a team led by LeBron James/Luka Doncic or Stephen Curry/Jimmy Butler will be the stuff of headaches, considering how much playoff experience those superstar players have.
As one would recall, it was Doncic who led the Mavericks last year in their second-round triumph over the Thunder, so if there’s any team who knows how dangerous Doncic is in a playoff setting, it’s OKC. And to combine that with James? The Lakers will give the Thunder some difficult problems to solve even with their lack of size.
Meanwhile, Curry and the Warriors have been acting differently since the Butler trade, and they have gotten back that swagger that has fueled them to so much playoff success over the past decade. Butler also elevates his game come playoff time and Curry can turn games quickly with his outside marksmanship.
Nonetheless, the Thunder should be equipped to deal with such challenges, although they may have to traverse the hardest road to reach the NBA’s mountaintop.
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