Up 3-1 in their best-of-seven Western Conference Championship series, the OKC Thunder head into Wednesday's Game 5 against the Timberwolves with an opportunity to punch their ticket to the NBA Finals.
Should this happen, based on recent findings, there's a high probability that they'll wind up squaring off against the Indiana Pacers during the 2025 title round, with Polymarket Sports giving such a matchup an 83.0 percent chance of becoming a reality.
To both organizations and their respective fan bases, these odds should be overwhelmingly exciting to see.
However, for the association as a whole, it is almost certainly nightmare fuel.
Thunder v. Pacers NBA Finals exact opposite of what league likely covets
Over the past several years, NBA viewership has seen a steady and, in many ways, steep decline.
In 2024-25 alone, the average viewership had dropped by roughly 2.0 percent compared to last season, and had dipped to its lowest mark since the pandemic-shortened seasons at 1.53 million viewers on average for their national television networks (TNT, ESPN, and ABC).
What makes this all the more concerning is that, along with regular season disinterest, it seems that fewer and fewer people have also been tuning in for the playoffs and NBA Finals, with four of the five lowest-viewed championship rounds in recorded history coming over the last five years.
While it's hard to pinpoint one main factor for this drop-off in attention, as there are likely a bevy of reasons at play, it's easy to say that having two small-market teams duking it out for the Larry O'Brien Trophy is far from a coveted matchup to present to the league's dwindling assortment of spectators.
The Thunder and Pacers both represent two under-marketed franchises in the game today, with the former ranking in at a middling 754,832 in total attendance (ranked 14) while the latter pulled in a mere 685,434 (ranked 25).
Now, granted, it goes without saying that both clubs have plenty of positive storylines attached to them and a plethora of aspects for onlookers to like.
After all, OKC is the youngest team to win back-to-back number one seeds and is spearheaded by the 2025 NBA MVP in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, while Indiana has been one of the hottest squads since midway through the regular season and has a budding superstar leading the charge in Tyrese Haliburton.
However, of all the possible matchups the NBA was likely hoping for to help fix their viewership dilemma, it's safe to assume that the Thunder vs. Pacers is near the bottom of their wish list.