Oklahoma City Thunder look to continue NBA dominance against Chicago Bulls

OKLAHOMA CITY – The Oklahoma City Thunder have a chance to make more National Basketball Association (NBA) history when they host the Chicago Bulls on March 31 (April 1, Singapore time).

The Thunder head into the game 27-1 against Eastern Conference opponents this season and another win would set an NBA record for most wins against an opposing conference in league history.

It is just the latest shot at accomplishing the unprecedented for a team who have been setting high benchmarks much of the season.

But Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the leading candidate for Most Valuable Player, has largely brushed off the achievements along the way, saying it does not matter unless Oklahoma City are able to accomplish their ultimate goal of winning a championship.

He said general manager Sam Presti set that tone at the beginning of the 2022-23 season after Chet Holmgren, the No. 2 pick in the 2022 NBA Draft, went down with an injury that kept him out the entirety of that season.

“Sam came in the first meeting of the year and said our destiny is ours to control and if we prioritise winning, we’ll win,” Gilgeous-Alexander said. “I think everyone received that message loud and clear and we’ve taken that and run with it these past few years and we’ve taken steps because of that.”

The Thunder (62-12) will face the Bulls on a nine-game winning streak, still with a chance to become just the third team in NBA history, after the Bulls and Golden State Warriors, to win 70 or more games in a season.

Oklahoma City are also three wins away from breaking the franchise mark for most wins in a season, set in 1995-96 when they were known as the Seattle Supersonics.

Even after clinching the top spot in the Western Conference, the Thunder have continued to excel.

Their five wins since have come by an average of 19 points per game, and they have won 48 games this season by double figures.

The Bulls (33-41), meanwhile, are fighting for positioning in the Eastern Conference play-in race.

Chicago are tied with Miami for ninth place in the conference with the Bulls holding the tiebreaker with the Heat.

They have won four of their last five but are coming off a 120-119 loss to the Dallas Mavericks on March 29.

Bulls coach Billy Donovan has been challenging his team to approach each game like a play-off game down the stretch. It does not figure to be too hard to do that in Oklahoma City, even with the form the Thunder are in.

“I would think from Atlanta to ourselves, to Orlando to Miami, every single game you’re jockeying there. We’ll all kind of bunched up together. All these games are like that. To be honest with you, that’s the way we’ve been trying to treat it,” he said.

Oklahoma City won their first meeting of the season, 114-95, on Oct 26 in Chicago. Chances are they will win the latest encounter as well.

It will also be the first game back in Oklahoma City for the Bulls’ Josh Giddey, who spent his first three seasons with the Thunder before being traded over the off-season in a deal that saw Alex Caruso go the other way.

Meanwhile, Donovan Mitchell led from the front as the Cleveland Cavaliers bagged their 60th win of the season with a 127-122 victory over the in-form Los Angeles Clippers on March 30.

Cleveland talisman Mitchell finished with 24 points, 12 rebounds and seven assists in what Cavs coach Kenny Atkinson later described as his best performance of the season.

The victory means Cleveland have reached 60 wins in a season for the first time since the 2009-2010 campaign, and for only the third time in franchise history.

More significantly, the win leaves them 4½ games clear of champions Boston Celtics in the race for the No. 1 seeding in the East with just seven regular-season fixtures remaining.

Atkinson said reaching 60 wins was beyond his expectations at the start of the campaign following a 48-victory season in 2023-24.

“I didn’t expect 60 wins. My internal goal was ‘Can we improve from last year?’ That was kind of where my mind was. But for this team to take it to another level and kind of shatter that says a lot. And we’re not done – we can still add to that,” he said. REUTERS, AFP