Opening Night in the NBA.
Two marquee games with big enough names to grab headlines and made tonight their own as the NBA returns to NBC.
No Major League Baseball (congrats to the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Toronto Blue Jays). No NFL until Thursday night. No college football. Just the return of the NBA.
As a colleague of mine said last night, “I haven’t been this excited for an NBA game in a long, long time.”
And this is coming from a couple of guys who have been in and out of NBA locker rooms and arenas, covering the league for over 25 years now.
The Houston Rockets versus the NBA Champion Oklahoma City Thunder.
Back to the Future Night, if you’re a movie nerd (and if you are, you’ll get this reference), where we can simultaneously look back and forward while in the present.
Ring Night.
In front of who – before the arrival, evolution and growth of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander – was arguably the face of the franchise for many years even after his departure in 2016, Kevin Durant.
It’s not a slight to Slim Reaper or a slap in the face that this franchise is getting their first ring with him in the arena as a visiting opponent.
However, it is a stark reminder that teams need to be grown, cultivated, and go through the growing pains of becoming a cohesive unit together, versus jumping ship and riding the coattails of other superstars to get a quick ring.
Or two of them, as it were.
The thing about the people receiving their rings tonight, is that they grew up together. They learn to play the game together. They learn to score and lean on each other. They learn to lean on each other’s defensive strengths.
This is a team that also went through adversity with regard to injury to one of their star players, while the others grew while he rehabilitated. That could have played out a whole lot differently without the mindset that these young Thunder have.
When you look at the 2012 Oklahoma City Thunder, and their subsequent breakup precipitated by the departure(s) of James Harden, then Durant, and eventually Russell Westbrook, we will never know what could have been.
Those three with Serge Ibaka, who will be in the arena tonight as well, showed a lot of promise in 2012. Even after Harden’s departure, the Thunder went all the way to the nth degree in effort in the Western Conference Finals against the Golden State Warriors.
They were on the precipice of something special, no doubt. But then Durant went with the mentality of “if you can’t beat them, join them.”
As well documented, Durant has moved on to teams two to three more times, currently with the Rockets, the Thunder’s opponent tonight.
Unless Durant wins a ring with these Rockets, he will always be known as the guy who could not do it himself. With two rings, that may be enough for KD; but it won’t bode well for his legacy.
He has a golden opportunity in Houston to be the mentor, the championship veteran if you will, to these young Rockets. Instead of being the add-on writing someone’s coattails, he should and could and hopefully will be the leader that gets this Rockets team to the next level.
Like other organic teams that have won the title in recent years – the Warriors, the Milwaukee Bucks, and the Boston Celtics – as well as there were the opponents like the Phoenix Suns (the ‘21 Suns, not the recently-failed Big Three bomb) and the Dallas Mavericks, all of those teams did it by learning and growing together.
They did not congregate or assemble superstars to win their championships – they created superstars, individually and a superstar team.
That’s what Sam Presti has done in assembling these Oklahoma City Thunder and the numerous iterations of the team that he has tried to put together over the years in between 2012 and 2024, after Harden and Durant went their separate ways.
Hopefully Durant is now wise enough to see this for what it is: a lesson that a sage, experienced, much wiser veteran can impart to a young team to make it as great as these Oklahoma City Thunder are standing here tonight.
That in itself will be Durant’s legacy. He’s already taken a step in the right direction that hardly anyone noticed by taking $30 million less to give the Rockets some financial flexibility.
Tonight’s celebration of 2024-25’s fruits doesn’t only cement Oklahoma City’s legacy; it’s simply laying the foundation for many more building blocks to continue building such a legacy.
It’s setting and raising the bar. You can raise the bar or you can wait for others to raise it – it’s getting raised, regardless.
Tonight’s a celebration, but the Thunder can’t let the moment eclipse the mission, not even for one game.
The bar has been set and tonight is a statement game for both teams – whether you, or I, or FanDuel fully agree or not.
Durant is more than capable, as are these Houston Rockets.
The only thing that stands in their way is the team they face tonight – the Oklahoma City Thunder … who start the defense of their lone championship in mere hours.
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Tracy ‘T-Money’ Graven is the Senior NBA Analyst for BackSportsPage.com owner of TMoneyMedia.com and also has his posts on SubStack at allballs.substack.com
He has written the NBA, appeared as a guest on NBA Radio, and the last 25+ years for HoopsWorld, Swish Magazine, HoopsHype, the Coach Scott Fields Show, NBARadioShow.com, and also tackles the NFL and NCAA. He’s spent 25+ years in locker rooms in Orlando, Boise (CBA, G League), San Antonio, Phoenix, Denver, Oklahoma City, and Atlanta.
He has raised five kids, and now currently resides in the heart of SEC Country near Knoxville, Tennessee – home of the 2024 Men’s Baseball World Series Champion Tennessee Volunteers.
Reach him on Twitter at @RealTMoneyMedia
