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Jalen Williams’s historically bad performance

Originally posted on Ball Exclusives | By Titan Frey | Last updated Jun 20, 2025 7:39 PM ET

Jalen Williams was all anyone could talk about after Game 5. He scored 40 points and led the Oklahoma City Thunder to a dominant 3-2 series lead.

After Game 6, people kept talking about Williams. This time, however, it was for another reason. Williams made history in Game 6, but not for anything good, as he had a historically bad performance.

In Game 5, Williams shot 14-25 from the field, including 3-5 from three, as he scored 40 points. Williams had a +14 plus-minus rating in the game, which tied him with teammate Luguentz Dort for the highest in the game.

In Game 6, things changed. Williams scored 16 points on 6-13 shooting. These numbers don’t look terrible, but his plus-minus rating is another story.

Williams finished with a -40 plus-minus rating, which was the lowest by a player in a Finals game in the play-by-play era.

Jalen Williams was -40 in Game 6.

The lowest plus/minus in a Finals game in the play-by-play era. pic.twitter.com/vhGg6aA70B

— StatMuse (@statmuse) June 20, 2025

Williams spoke about his mindset and the upcoming Game 7 after the game.

“The human element didn’t creep in for me until we got blown out. I didn’t start thinking about Game 7 until we walked off the floor. Really like when the game was really out of reach,” Williams said.

“I think we had the right mindset coming into it. I think there was different things we didn’t do in the game well that hurt us. Closing out in the Finals is different than a playoff game because it’s the end of the season. You play for so long that it just has more weight to it. Obviously, you want to win a championship.

“You don’t want to feel like it was all for nothing. That’s been the biggest difference between closing out now as opposed to a Denver series or Minnesota.”

Williams and the Thunder now have to forget about Game 6 and focus on Game 7. They still have the advantage as the crucial final game will be played in Oklahoma City.

This article first appeared on Ball Exclusives and was syndicated with permission.

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