Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and the Oklahoma City Thunder left no doubt in the Western Conference Finals, defeating the Minnesota Timberwolves in five games with a dominant performance at home in Game 5.
OKC allowed just nine points in the first quarter, and it went on to blow the Wolves out by 30 — 124-94 — to advance to the NBA Finals for the first time since the 2011-12 season.
The No. 1 seed in the Western Conference had the best record in the NBA during the regular season, going 68-14, and it will have home court in the NBA Finals against the winner of the Indiana Pacers-New York Knicks Eastern Conference Finals matchup.
Indiana currently leads that series 3-1, but that hasn’t stopped oddsmakers from setting OKC as a sizable favorite to win the title. After the Thunder’s Game 5 win, oddsmakers at DraftKings moved OKC to -750 to win the Finals. Using implied probability, OKC has an 88.24 percent chance to win the title based on these odds.
This shouldn’t come as a surprise, since the Thunder posted a historic net rating during the regular season and finished with the top defense in the NBA as well.
OKC will now have several days off before the NBA Finals begin on Thursday, June 5.
The Pacers (+650 to win the title) and Knicks (+3500 to win the title) play Game 5 of the Eastern Conference Finals on Thursday night. There’s a chance that the Finals will be set a week in advance, and Indiana is expected to reach the Finals since only 13 teams in NBA history have come back from a 3-1 series deficit.
Oddsmakers also released hypothetical odds for a Pacers-Thunder NBA Finals, setting OKC as as -800 favorite to beat Indiana. If the Knicks somehow come back and win the Eastern Conference Finals, oddsmakers have the Thunder set as -700 favorites to beat them in the NBA Finals.
Odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.
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