Shai Gilgeous-Alexander earns the Bill Russell NBA Finals MVP after averaging 30.3 points in the 2025 NBA Finals.
OKLAHOMA CITY – Completing the longest season of his basketball life, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander finished with a flourish Sunday night. The Oklahoma City MVP and scoring champion led his team to its first NBA championship and earned the Bill Russell Finals MVP award.
What his Game 7 performance lacked in efficiency – he shot 8-for-27, including 2-for-12 on 3-pointers – it made up for in effectiveness in helping to eliminate the Indiana Pacers 103-91 in the clincher. Gilgeous-Alexander scored 29 points with five rebounds, 12 assists, two blocked shots and one steal in 40 minutes, frequently creating the space to set up all those teammates and generally making sure the Thunder never trailed after the opening moments of the second half.
“So many hours, so many moments, so many emotions, so many nights of disbelief, so many nights of belief,” Gilgeous-Alexander said courtside immediately after the game, swarmed by teammates ahead of the trophy presenttions.
SGA’s year paralleled and helped to shape the Thunder’s. The team essentially went wire-to-wire in posting the league’s best record (68-14) before adding 16 more victories to win the Larry O’Brien Trophy. OKC also joined the 1995-96 and 1996-97 Chicago Bulls as the only teams to reach or surpass 84 total victories.
Gilgeous-Alexander, 26, matched that pattern. He led the NBA in scoring with 32.7 ppg, earned All-NBA first team honors for the second time and was voted the 2024-25 Kia Most Valuable Player by a healthy margin over Denver’s Nikola Jokić.
In the playoffs, the 6-foot-6 elusive, angles-playing scorer helped the top-seeded Thunder through the first three rounds of Western Conference play and earned Western Conference Finals MVP honors. Then he wrapped things up in the championship series, averaging 30.3 points in the seven games.
SGA = NBA FINALS MVP
⛈️ 30.3 PPG⛈️ 4.6 RPG⛈️ 5.6 APG⛈️ 1.9 SPG
⛈️ 1.6 BPG@shaiglalex‘s special 7-game series lifts the Thunder to their first title in the OKC era! pic.twitter.com/kuMT7qxvdY
— NBA (@NBA) June 23, 2025
As if the trophies he collected weren’t elite enough considering their namesakes – Michael Jordan (MVP), Magic Johnson (West Finals MVP) and Russell (Finals MVP) – Gilgeous-Alexander joined another exclusive club Sunday night. Only Jordan (four times), Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in 1971 and Shaquille O’Neal in 2000 in NBA history won the MVP, the scoring title and the Finals MVP in one season.
“Yeah, it’s hard to believe that I’m part of that group,” Gilgeous-Alexander said. “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.”
As spectacular as his skills are, though, Gilegous-Alexander’s unflappable demeanor means nearly as much to the Thunder, coach Mark Daigneault said.
“He really doesn’t change in any circumstance,” Daigneault said over the weekend. “You could look at him in any situation, and it’s pretty consistent. He’s got an unbelievable ability to be present, poised, but confident.
“His confidence is certainly contagious. … That’s been continuous through time. He’s always had kind of an uncanny ability to stay confident through all the ups and downs, stay consistent and grounded even when we’re in the ups.”
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Steve Aschburner has written about the NBA since 1980. You can e-mail him here, find his archive here and follow him on X.
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