Sam Presti excited for Nikola Topic's upcoming 'monster summer'

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Making his NBA debut right before the All-Star break, Nikola Topic jogging towards the scorer's table had extra weight of sentimentality to it. What's a mundane activity for every other NBA player morphed into a personal achievement after a two-year journey.

The Oklahoma City Thunder added Topic with the No. 12 pick of the 2024 NBA draft. It took him until Feb. 2026 to finally log an NBA stat. Regardless of how his career plays out, that's an accomplishment in itself when you remember his story.

Sustaining a torn ACL that dropped him to the No. 12 spot, Topic had a redshirt year as he recovered from the knee injury. He became the first NBA player to win a ring before even logging a minute. While it was a major setback, a torn ACL is pretty small potatoes compared to what he eventually dealt with later.

Playing in the 2025 Summer League and the preseason opener, Topic had his entire life shaken up. He was diagnosed with testicular cancer in Oct. 2025. That scary, life-altering prognosis put basketball in the back shelf. He spent the next four months going through rounds of chemotherapy to eventually beat the cancer.

Ramping up in the G League, Topic eventually made his NBA debut in OKC's loss to the Milwaukee Bucks right before the NBA All-Star break started. Thunder GM Sam Presti talked about his journey to get to that point in his 2025-26 end-of-season press conference. He's the one who broke the news to a local group of reporters during their training camp.

"It was something that none of us had experienced. There's something about his maturity and how he handled that. I just can't underscore that enough. It's an unbelievable approach to all that in very, very difficult circumstances," Presti said. "Our medical staff, Donnie Strack, I'm thinking of a better word than superlative, but just humane and empathetic. Just unbelievable during that period of time."

It's pretty rare to see an active NBA player deal with cancer. Looking through the league's history, there are a few examples. So it was nice to hear the Thunder went all out to support Topic in his brutally unique situation. Once he returned, he spent the rest of the season going between the G League and the NBA. In OKC's playoff run, he mostly played mop-up minutes.

Despite all of the life hurdles he had to jump through, the Thunder remain high on Topic. As the Western Conference Finals showed, you can never have enough ball-handlers. If the 20-year-old can show out in a super-important third season in OKC, he could completely change the dynamics of its depth chart for the better. At one point, he was viewed as a possible top-five pick in his draft class.

"I'm very proud of him. I think he's going to have just like a monster summer. Finally, because last year he was recovering from the knee. Obviously, this year was a challenge because just to get him up to speed and get him enough games in the G-League to get some conditioning, but he's a really talented player," Presti said. "So we're really looking forward to seeing him. He's going to play Summer League, and we'll get him back out there. But he showed tremendous perseverance."

With impending roster changes, the Thunder could see an opening of minutes up for grabs. Topic is a candidate to get some of those. Regardless if he takes advantage of them, OKC owes it to itself to at least see if he can sink or swim in the NBA. As the No. 12 pick from two drafts ago, he hasn't had a real opportunity to sponge up real minutes. This upcoming season will be his now-or-never moment.

"I was really proud of our entire program to give him enough space but support him," Presti said. "He makes it easy to support him."

This article originally appeared on OKC Thunder Wire: Sam Presti excited for Nikola Topic's upcoming 'monster summer'

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