Good morning, I’m Tyler Lauletta. I’m trying my best not to cry because the 2025 NBA postseason is over, and instead smile because it happened.

In today’s SI:AM: 

🏀Thunder getting started
⚾LSU’s Great 8
🏀Clark struggles

Oklahoma City finishes the job.

It didn’t take long for Game 7 of the NBA Finals to turn upside down.

About halfway through the first quarter between the Pacers and Thunder, Indiana star guard Tyrese Haliburton went down. If “Game 7” are the two best words in sports, “non-contact injury” might be the two worst. Haliburton, who had lifted the Pacers up time and time again when his team needed him most this postseason, who had assured the world that as long as he was good enough to walk, he was good enough to play, left it all on the floor.

It was a heartbreaking turn that loomed over the rest of the evening, but to the Pacers’ credit, they did not fold, even taking a one-point lead into halftime despite being without their star.

But eventually, the Thunder simply proved too much for the Pacers to handle. Oklahoma City’s offense started humming in the third quarter, and once they extended the lead to double-digits for the first time, they were able to ride their best-in-the-league defense all the way to the title. At one point, they held the Pacers scoreless for more than five straight minutes of game action. Yep, that’ll do it.

In the fourth quarter, the Pacers tried to bring the game back into striking distance, at one point cutting what had been a 21-point Thunder lead down to 10. Without Haliburton on the floor, they simply could not find that final gear needed to get over the hump and turn the game on its head as they had so many times this postseason.

It was, of course, MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander leading the way for OKC, with 29 points on the night even as he struggled shooting from the floor. Chet Holmgren also stepped up big for the Thunder, providing 18 points, eight rebounds and five blocks in what was one of his best performances of the postseason. Rounding out OKC’s young triumvirate was Jalen Williams with 20 points, four rebounds and four assists. Drop the confetti and get ready to raise a banner, folks. You did it.

After the final horn sounded, ESPN cameras in the Pacers tunnel captured what I think will go down as the lasting image from this game—Haliburton, on crutches, greeting each of his teammates as they came back to the locker room.

Speaking with reporters after the game, forward Obi Toppin summed things up with a brutal line.

“We needed Ty out there,” Toppin said, his voice almost breaking. “He’s been good for us all year. For him to go down in the beginning of the game like that, it like, sucked the soul out of us. I ain’t going to say out of everybody, but I don’t think that I played good because I was thinking about it the whole day. I felt like it was my fault.”

Haliburton being on the floor to end things is what this series—and this entire postseason—deserved, but sometimes these things happen in sports.

We didn’t get the storybook Game 7 finale we had been hoping for, but it was still a good one, and it crowned a worthy champion.

The Thunder were the best team all season, and the best team all playoffs. They now join two iterations of the Jordan Bulls as the only teams to finish a year with 84 wins and a championship. Gilgeous-Alexander is the fourth player in league history to win MVP, Finals MVP and the scoring title in the same year, joining a list that only includes Jordan, Kareem and Shaq. No one else.

As a rule, it’s good not to start making dynasty cases until a team has at least two titles, but the signs are certainly there for OKC. They were already the second-youngest team in the history of the NBA Finals, and their core still has years of improving before they become the best versions of themselves—SGA is 26, Williams 24, Holmgren 23. They have the assets to keep adding pieces depending on what they need from year to year, and with a championship already under their belt, there’s no more wondering if the lights will be too bright for this crew. This year in the locker room, veteran Alex Caruso had to teach his younger teammates how to open bottles of champagne. If and when the Thunder get back to the winner’s circle, that won’t be an issue either.

As for the Pacers, man, this is a tough one. As much as you hope they can be proud of the effort and the run they had through the postseason, it’s so difficult to do that when they were two quarters away from a life-changing result.

Championships last forever. The title follows a player—no matter how much longer their career goes, which cities they land in, the shots they make or miss over the rest of their lives. The 2025 Thunder will forever be champions.

It was a great year of basketball. Can’t wait for the next one. Until then, it’s time to lock in for the NBA offseason. Did you hear Kevin Durant got traded? 

The best of Sports Illustrated

The top five…

…non-NBA Finals bits of news that happened this weekend that you might have missed.

5. The Phillies took two out of three against the Mets to keep hold of first place in the NL East. Look at this fun slide.
4. Travis Hunter officially signed with the Jacksonville Jaguars. Just 10 weeks until football season!
3. Team USA Ryder Cup captain Keegan Bradley outdueled Team Europe Ryder Cup player Tommy Fleetwood in the final round at Travelers Championship.
2. Congratulations to LSU baseball, you are national champions.
1. No seriously Kevin Durant got traded.

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This article was originally published on www.si.com as SI:AM | Thunderous Applause.

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