Oklahoma City Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. Alonzo Adams-Imagn Images

Another auspicious sign for Thunder's NBA title chances

By Sai Mohan | Last updated May 23, 2025 9:15 AM ET

It's one thing to beat teams in nail-biting contests. It's another to pummel them on a nightly basis.

The Oklahoma City Thunder beat opponents by an NBA record margin of 12.9 points in the regular season. They have remarkably upped their points differential to 14.1 points through 13 playoff games thus far.

Overall, OKC has maintained a 78-17 record in 2024-25 (playoffs included) while routing teams by historic margins.

With their 118-103 Game 2 rout of the Minnesota Timberwolves on Thursday, the Thunder registered their 60th win of the season by 10 or more points. They are just the second team in NBA history to accomplish this feat, following the 2016-17 Golden State Warriors, who went on to win it all.

With tonight's win, the @okcthunder have now won 60 GAMES by 10+ PTS in the reg. season + playoffs combined

They are only the 2nd team in NBA history to accomplish this feat. The other?

The NBA Champion 2016-17 Warriors https://t.co/6X2ipDy0Fd pic.twitter.com/WxTFhDONyv
— NBA (@NBA) May 23, 2025

The statistical milestone marks another precedent that all but guarantees a Thunder NBA championship victory. As is well documented, the five other teams with the largest points differential in NBA history — the 1971-72 Los Angeles Lakers, 1970-71 Milwaukee Bucks, 1995-96 Chicago Bulls, 2016-17 Warriors, and 2023-24 Boston Celtics — all went on to hoist the Larry O'Brien Trophy. As such, a significant historical precedent would be broken if Thunder falter in the conference finals or the championship round.

If the Thunder don't complete the mission, they'd become the second team to win at least 68 regular-season games before faltering in the playoffs. They would join the 2015-16 Warriors, who won a record 73 games before falling to the Cleveland Cavaliers in the 2016 NBA Finals.

At this point, anything but an NBA championship should be considered a disappointment for the Thunder, despite their relative inexperience in the playoff stage. The oddsmakers are confident in their ability to hang a banner, giving them the shortest odds to win the title.

Sai Mohan

A veteran sportswriter based in Portugal, Sai covers the NBA for Yardbarker and a few local news outlets. He had the honor of covering sporting events across four different continents as a newspaper reporter. Some of his all-time favorite athletes include Mike Tyson, Larry Bird, Luís Figo, Ayrton Senna and Steffi Graf.

More must-reads: