With the NBA All-Star Game officially over, the league now turns its attention to the final few months of regular season action. The OKC Thunder and their fanbase should be brimming with excitement and wonder as they enter this stretch.
Outside of the fact that they step back into action as the top seed in the Western Conference and sport the best record in the association at 44-10, with the rate at which Oklahoma City was playing before the annual star-studded break, the ball club restarts their campaign on pace to thrust themselves into the record books in several specific categories.
From team-wide achievements to individual efforts, we take a look at a few impressive feats the Thunder seem to be on track to accomplish during the second half of the 2024-25 regular season.
Youngest team in NBA history to finish as No. 1 seed twice in a row
Last year, the Thunder made history as the youngest team to finish the year as a number-one seed with an average age of 23.9 years.
Now, 54 games into their follow-up, it seems the ball club is once again on track to finish with this same, high-end standing in the Western Conference as they are already a whopping eight games ahead of the second-seeded Memphis Grizzlies (36-18).
Should this wind up being the outcome yet again, at an average age of 24.4 among active players attached to standard contracts, they would establish themselves as the youngest team in league history to finish as the number one seed in two straight seasons.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander joins Michael Jordan in exclusive stat club
As a collective the OKC Thunder are undoubtedly in the running for being known as the best team in the association, but equally as impressive is the fact that they are spearheaded by perhaps the most well-rounded player in the game, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.
Seemingly improving with every year, the seventh-season vet finds himself amid easily his best campaign yet, as he's dropping sensational per-game averages of 32.5 points, 6.1 assists, 5.1 rebounds, 1.9 steals, and 1.0 blocks on 52.3 percent shooting from the floor and 35.9 percent from distance.
Should he manage to up his production in the steals department by just .1 per night (a rather easy task to accomplish for SGA), the Thunder superstar will officially become the only player outside of Michael Jordan to post at least 31.0 points, 6.0 assists, and 2.0 steals while shooting 50 percent or better from the floor per game.
Finish with the best single-season Thunder record
Throughout their 58-year existence as both the Thunder and Seattle SuperSonics, the franchise has won 60 or more games in a season on four separate occasions. Their all-time record of 64 wins was set back during the 1994-95 season.
Already at 44 wins and with 28 games remaining in 2024-25, it is the belief of many that Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and company will end up setting a new record in this department for Oklahoma City, as their current pace has them projected to come away with 67 or 68 wins.
Considering they've managed to establish this trajectory while dealing with widespread health issues and key player absences, the fact that they're now finally seeing several core players like Chet Holmgren return to action and will find others such as Ajay Mitchell make their way back to the floor over the next several weeks only betters their odds of finishing with such a success rate.
Greatest Net rating of all time
As noted, the Thunder have been playing at sub-full strength this entire year due to their incredibly unlucky injury woes.
While the fact that they're on pace to set the franchise's record for wins in a single season even with these struggles is certainly impressive, what's arguably more astonishing is that they hold the best Net rating by any team in NBA history despite their key player absences.
As things currently stand, Oklahoma City registers with a net rating (a measurement of a team's point differential per 100 possessions) of 13.5. If the campaign were to end today, this would officially surpass the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls as the greatest of all time.
With the big-three of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Jalen Williams, and Chet Holmgren now back together on the court, no one should expect this type of efficiency to drop during these final 28 games.