Though most fans may be too busy rejoicing over the fact that the OKC Thunder have now taken a 3-0 series lead over the Suns to notice, a long-standing Chet Holmgren issue quietly resurfaced during Saturday's commanding win.
2025-26 has proven to be a career-best campaign for the young big man, as he finished the year averaging new statistical highs virtually all across the board.
However, his 17.1 points-per-game stat line unfortunately hasn't masked the fact that he's been rather up-and-down as a scoring weapon throughout year three.
A few weeks back, veteran sportswriter Zach Lowe shed light on his belief that Holmgren has been a wildly inconsistent offensive producer for the Thunder all year long, particularly lambasting him for his plethora of sub-20 point games and lack of aggressiveness when attempting to create opportunities for himself.
On a night where Oklahoma City presumably would have benefited most from an uptick in the All-Star's scoring contributions, what with the absence of Jalen Williams (left hamstring strain), sadly, Holmgren's services were nowhere to be found.
Thunder go up 3-0 despite Chet Holmgren's underwhelming offense
With nearly 14 shot attempts up for grabs with Williams sidelined (averaged 13.5 this season), Holmgren only went on to hoist a middling six shots of his own in 29 minutes of action in Game 3.
Now, granted, the big man was certainly efficient with his attempts, cashing in on five of them, but finishing the contest with just 10 points while supposedly being this team's second in command is wildly underwhelming.
It also doesn't help that, unlike the previous two games, Saturday's bout was far from a cakewalk for Oklahoma City, as they found themselves down by as many as nine points at one point and only pulled away with an 11-point lead.
To put this into perspective, the average margin of victory for the previous two bouts was plus-24.
As if it already wasn't an issue, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander had to shoulder an obscene amount of the offensive workload for the Thunder on the day, as he went on to drop a whopping 42 points, a new playoff career-high.
On the one hand, this new feat is something to celebrate; on the other hand, however, one could view it as a knock on Holmgren for not stepping up in the scoring department himself and saving his star running mate from such ridiculous usage.
Yes, seeing Oklahoma City go up three games to one in this best-of-seven is certainly exciting. But the fact that the club's number two option finished number four in scoring and number eight in shot attempts is something that suggests his offensive woes from the regular season are still very much prevalent here in the playoffs.
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