Thunder cruise past Suns again but lose Jalen Williams

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scores 37 arsenic Oklahoma City bushed Phoenix Suns 120-107 successful the Western Conference playoff series.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 37 points and dished retired ‌‌nine assists, starring Oklahoma City to a 120-107 location triumph implicit the Phoenix Suns and giving the ⁠⁠Thunder a 2-0 pb successful ⁠⁠a first-round Western Conference playoff series.

The triumph connected Wednesday, however, mightiness person been a costly 1 for the hosts.

Thunder subordinate Jalen Williams, who was constricted to conscionable 33 games during the regular play owed to injuries, near the ⁠⁠game midway done the 3rd 4th owed to a near hamstring injury.

“We’ll instrumentality a look astatine it successful the adjacent mates of days, and we’ll update you guys appropriately,” Oklahoma City manager Mark Daigneault said of Williams’ presumption post-game.

Williams pulled up during ⁠⁠a thrust towards the bucket and past grabbed astatine his hamstring arsenic enactment went the different way.

Williams, who did not return, missed 2 agelong stretches of the play with injuries to his close wrist and close hamstring.

Before getting hurt, Williams was excellent, logging 19 points connected 7-of-11 shooting and 4 assists successful 23 minutes.

Oklahoma City seized power successful the 3rd quarter, acknowledgment successful ample ‌‌part to Gilgeous-Alexander and Chet Holmgren.

Holmgren grabbed rebounds connected each of the archetypal 3 possessions of the fractional and had 11 points and 3 blocks successful the quarter, portion Gilgeous-Alexander had 12 points and 4 assists successful the period.

Holmgren finished with 19 points, 8 rebounds and 4 blocks.

The Thunder stretched their pb to 23 with a 13-2 tally to extremity the 3rd and past to 26 aboriginal successful the fourth.

The Suns chopped the shortage to 10 with astir 4 minutes remaining, but coming retired of a timeout, Ajay Mitchell deed a 3-pointer to agelong the spread ⁠⁠to 113-100.

“We did a truly bully occupation gathering the pb that we did successful the ⁠⁠third heading into the fourth,” Daigneault said. “Obviously the 4th was a small wacky. We’ll ticker that … But generally, it was a bully one. We built a beardown pb and were capable to clasp it.”

Phoenix’s Dillon Brooks scored 13 of his 30 points successful the fourth.

After a dilatory commencement successful ⁠⁠Game 1, Gilgeous-Alexander missed his archetypal 3 shots connected Wednesday, past recovered the range. He deed 7 of 10 shots the remainder of the archetypal half.

After going 5 of 18 from ⁠⁠the tract successful the bid opener, Gilgeous-Alexander finished 13 of 25 successful Game ⁠⁠2.

“Shai made the close play each night,” Daigneault said. “His level crippled was outstanding. He got america truly bully shots.”

Early successful the 3rd quarter, Brooks and Oklahoma City’s Luguentz Dort got tangled up battling for a imaginable rebound disconnected a escaped throw. The 2 rapidly stepped distant from each other, but each ‌‌was whistled for a method foul.

Late successful the quarter, Devin Booker was called for a method aft bouncing the shot disconnected Williams portion trying to support it successful play.

“This is simply a playoff bid truthful a batch of worldly happens,” ‌‌said ‌‌Suns manager Jordan Ott, who added that helium did not get an mentation of the call. “We tin bash a amended occupation keeping our composure astatine times.”

Booker finished with 22 points, portion Jalen Green had 21 successful the loss.

Game 3 is scheduled for Saturday successful Phoenix.