Throughout the 2024-25 regular season, one of the biggest fears for this title-hungry OKC Thunder team was that Jalen Williams might lack the upside necessary to serve as a number two option next to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.
While he may have put forth a career-best campaign and established himself as a legitimate All-Star in the process, even during the direct months leading into the playoffs question marks about J-Dub's ability to "run the show" on offense, particularly while their superstar is being properly gameplanned against, were still found popping up.
Excitingly enough, Friday night's Game 3 against the Nuggets finally seemed to provide fans with unbridled confidence in the forward's potential, as Williams played the best postseason game of his career, dropping 32 points on 52.4 percent shooting and 42.9 percent shooting from deep.
However, in a painfully ironic turn of events, while the Thunder may have finally gotten an answer to their biggest title concern, it was their trusty cornerstone in Gilgeous-Alexander who fell short of capitalizing on the moment.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander failed to compliment Thunder star's epic play
On a night where the pressure was on Oklahoma City to bring their A game, as they were playing their first contest out in Denver and trying to regain home-court advantage, SGA shockingly failed to answer the call.
In his 44 minutes of action, the MVP frontrunner struggled mightily with his offensive game, posting 18 points on 22 shot attempts, translating to a harrowing 31.8 percent conversion rate from the field.
His struggles were most apparent during the crucial final period of regulation, where, despite tying for the most shots in the quarter with eight, he only managed to make one. Gilgeous-Alexander would also miss the would-be game-winner with 4.1 seconds to go in the fourth.
This particular chain of events not only should have infuriated fans considering he drove into three defenders and hoisted up a bad, off-balance heave, but, also, because it literally took the ball away from the most trusted scoring presence during that specific quarter in Williams, who was shooting 62.5 percent and had just hit a clutch bucket to give them a 100-99 lead not too long before.
Instead of feeding the hot hand in crunch time, the Thunder reverted to hero ball antics with the clearly cold SGA and, in turn, the game extended into overtime, where they were downed 113-104 and, now, find themselves down 2-1 in this best-of-seven semifinal series.
While it may be easy to play Monday morning quarterback, considering how things unfolded coupled with Shai's already questionable scoring efficiency not just during the game but, frankly, this entire postseason run so far (43.8 percent shooting from the field, 18.2 percent in clutch time), shying away from the clear difference-maker on the night in Jalen Williams was far from the ideal move.
Hopefully, Dub can continue on with this level of play, and Shai can find a way to snap out of this ongoing offensive rut. Otherwise, how the final seconds of Game 3 played out could very quickly be viewed as the moment that this semifinal series took a turn for the worse.