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During last night's 114-110 overtime win for the Oklahoma City Thunder over the Detroit Pistons, reigning league MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander flexed his muscles during clutch time, scoring 15 points on three-for-three shooting, dishing out two assists and hitting nine of his 11 free-throw attempts to help his team secure the impressive win over the East's No. 1 seed.
Gilgeous-Alexander arguably should have had the clutchest shot of the night, too, considering he hit what would have been the game-winner before it was called off due to a questionable push-off foul:
Even after that turnover, Gilgeous-Alexander still very much carried his team to the win with his brilliance in the last five minutes and overtime, which led to a lot of talk about the Canadian star's consistency in clutch time this entire campaign.
In clutch situations, which the NBA defines as when a game is within five points or fewer with five minutes left in regulation, or in any overtime period, Gilgeous-Alexander has been spectacular, shooting 51.5 percent from the floor (52-of-101), while leading the Thunder to a 20-7 record. That was nothing new for the 27-year-old, as, according to Underdog NBA, Gilgeous-Alexander hasn't missed a shot in the fourth quarter or overtime since March 17:
What's more, looking at the annals of NBA history - at least dating back to the time frame for which we have clutch time stats - Gilgeous-Alexander's 2025-26 season has produced the second-highest clutch scoring average in league history. SGA is averaging 6.48 points per game in clutch situations this season, trailing only Russell Westbrook's 2016-17 campaign for the most clutch points per game in recorded history. In third place is James Harden's 2018-19 Houston Rockets season, in which he put up 5.95 clutch points per game.
In addition to all that, we used our Clutch Rating metric - a variation of our own Global Rating stat - to determine the clutchest seasons in league history. (Clutch Rating focuses on individual statistical performances, tied in with team performance, to measure overall impact during the last five minutes of games with a five-point margin.)
According to our metric, Gilgeous-Alexander just barely trails 2016-17 Westbrook and 2009-10 LeBron James, with a 5.14 Clutch Rating compared to their 5.15. What makes SGA's case even more remarkable is that he is the only player to appear multiple times in the all-time Top 10: his 2023-24 season (4.77) ranks fourth, while his 2020-21 campaign (4.57) ranks ninth.
So for all of the talk that some of his foes in this year's MVP race, like Luka Doncic, get for their clutch prowess, Gilgeous-Alexander might quietly be the clutchest of the bunch.
Of course, there are factors that hurt Gilgeous-Alexander as far as 2025-26 being the clutchest season by any player ever. For starters, the Thunder are so good that they're rarely in clutch situations, so the sample size is much smaller for SGA. Gilgeous-Alexander has only had 27 games all season long where he has faced clutch situations, and has only been on the floor for just over 125 minutes in those situations. For comparison's sake, Westbrook in 2016-17 played in 67 games with clutch situations (roughly 304 minutes), and James in 2009-10 played in 69 clutch games (and around 314 such minutes).
Still, that might make Gilgeous-Alexander's 2025-26 output in clutch time all the more impressive, because the rare times that OKC has been on the ropes late in games, the 2024-25 MVP has been downright unstoppable. With such a small sample size, a few more missed shots would have plummeted SGA in the Clutch Rating numbers, but he's been so good in those brief pressure-packed scenarios that instead he nearly ranks first all-time in the metric.
This article originally appeared on Hoops Hype: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander may be having the most clutch season ever
Continue reading...
Gilgeous-Alexander arguably should have had the clutchest shot of the night, too, considering he hit what would have been the game-winner before it was called off due to a questionable push-off foul:
Even after that turnover, Gilgeous-Alexander still very much carried his team to the win with his brilliance in the last five minutes and overtime, which led to a lot of talk about the Canadian star's consistency in clutch time this entire campaign.
In clutch situations, which the NBA defines as when a game is within five points or fewer with five minutes left in regulation, or in any overtime period, Gilgeous-Alexander has been spectacular, shooting 51.5 percent from the floor (52-of-101), while leading the Thunder to a 20-7 record. That was nothing new for the 27-year-old, as, according to Underdog NBA, Gilgeous-Alexander hasn't missed a shot in the fourth quarter or overtime since March 17:
What's more, looking at the annals of NBA history - at least dating back to the time frame for which we have clutch time stats - Gilgeous-Alexander's 2025-26 season has produced the second-highest clutch scoring average in league history. SGA is averaging 6.48 points per game in clutch situations this season, trailing only Russell Westbrook's 2016-17 campaign for the most clutch points per game in recorded history. In third place is James Harden's 2018-19 Houston Rockets season, in which he put up 5.95 clutch points per game.
In addition to all that, we used our Clutch Rating metric - a variation of our own Global Rating stat - to determine the clutchest seasons in league history. (Clutch Rating focuses on individual statistical performances, tied in with team performance, to measure overall impact during the last five minutes of games with a five-point margin.)
According to our metric, Gilgeous-Alexander just barely trails 2016-17 Westbrook and 2009-10 LeBron James, with a 5.14 Clutch Rating compared to their 5.15. What makes SGA's case even more remarkable is that he is the only player to appear multiple times in the all-time Top 10: his 2023-24 season (4.77) ranks fourth, while his 2020-21 campaign (4.57) ranks ninth.
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So for all of the talk that some of his foes in this year's MVP race, like Luka Doncic, get for their clutch prowess, Gilgeous-Alexander might quietly be the clutchest of the bunch.
Of course, there are factors that hurt Gilgeous-Alexander as far as 2025-26 being the clutchest season by any player ever. For starters, the Thunder are so good that they're rarely in clutch situations, so the sample size is much smaller for SGA. Gilgeous-Alexander has only had 27 games all season long where he has faced clutch situations, and has only been on the floor for just over 125 minutes in those situations. For comparison's sake, Westbrook in 2016-17 played in 67 games with clutch situations (roughly 304 minutes), and James in 2009-10 played in 69 clutch games (and around 314 such minutes).
Still, that might make Gilgeous-Alexander's 2025-26 output in clutch time all the more impressive, because the rare times that OKC has been on the ropes late in games, the 2024-25 MVP has been downright unstoppable. With such a small sample size, a few more missed shots would have plummeted SGA in the Clutch Rating numbers, but he's been so good in those brief pressure-packed scenarios that instead he nearly ranks first all-time in the metric.
This article originally appeared on Hoops Hype: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander may be having the most clutch season ever
Continue reading...
