Shai Gilgeous-Alexander on ending his own 141-game streak: ‘It’s not the end of the world,’ and Chet Holmgren says ‘he’s a better man than me’

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander had 1 minute and 43 seconds to score three more points and keep the longest 20-point streak in NBA history alive. He decided he did not need them. “I saw that they had subbed, so I was just like, we should sub too,” the Oklahoma City Thunder guard said after Thursday’s 96-84 win over the Denver Nuggets. “I feel like you always treat the game with respect.”

“And God willing, I have many more games to start another streak,” he added. “So it’s like, it’s not the end of the world.”

Gilgeous-Alexander finished with 17 points on 6-of-19 shooting, ending a run of 141 straight regular-season games with at least 20 that began on Nov. 1, 2024. He had scored 10 points in five and a half minutes to get within three, the last of them on a 27-foot three that put Oklahoma City up 93-76. Then, with Denver emptying its bench, he went to coach Mark Daigneault and asked to come out, and Kenrich Williams checked in for him.

The video above of Gilgeous-Alexander’s postgame news conference was posted by the Thunder.

‘We’ll talk about it one day’

Asked whether he had taken time to reflect on the streak, the two-time reigning MVP said he had not. “Not really. It’s all wound up in the game and the day-to-day process,” he said. “We’ll talk about it one day, I guess.” Asked about another milestone, he gave a similar answer: “All those stats are cool, obviously,” but “you just get wound up in the game, you attack it on both ends and try to be the best player you can be.”

He was more interested in how Oklahoma City won with its stars cold. The Thunder forced 22 turnovers and held Denver to a point total that tied its lowest since February 2019, while Nikola Jokic went 5-of-19. “Obviously tonight shots weren’t falling for us. There’s no secret,” Gilgeous-Alexander said. “We knew going into halftime that if we wanted to win this game, it was going to have to be on that end, and we did so.” The win did not surprise the group, he said: “We’ve won like this before. We know we’re capable of winning games when we don’t make shots.”

Holmgren: ‘He’s a better man than me’

Chet Holmgren, who had 12 points, 17 rebounds and 4 blocks, said he gave Gilgeous-Alexander a chance to keep going. “I asked him, I said, ‘You want to shoot some threes right here?’ And he was like, ‘Nah,'” Holmgren said. “And then he went up to Mark and subbed himself out. So I told him he’s a better man than me. I would have been shooting some pull-up threes.”

“I think it was a selfless moment, and he’s a selfless guy. One of the hardest workers that I know,” Holmgren added. He said people underrate what the streak required beyond talent: “He’s never sprained an ankle and missed the rest of a game early on. He’s never gotten ejected early on. Just the physical and mental endurance that it takes to do something like that is extremely impressive. And it’s not surprising. If anybody’s able to do it, it’s him.”

Jalen Williams: ‘I’ll just restart’

Jalen Williams, who led Oklahoma City with 21 points, said Gilgeous-Alexander was already over it by the time he reached the locker room. “He’s a smart man. Those last minute and a minute of the game, probably only bad stuff can happen,” Williams said. “I think it just speaks to how well he can keep stuff in perspective. He walked in the locker room, he said, ‘I’ll just restart.'” Williams added that Gilgeous-Alexander pointed out he still had 80 games left.

Brought the energy tonight 💪

Dub hits the mic postgame after the win 🎤 pic.twitter.com/DiDt0Aqktb

— OKC THUNDER (@okcthunder) October 23, 2026

The video above of Williams’ postgame news conference was posted by the Thunder.

“It’s extremely difficult. That’s why there’s only one person that’s done it,” Williams said of the streak. “If you don’t play basketball, you probably don’t even realize how crazy that is. People in video games don’t do that.” As someone who scored 20 himself on Thursday, he said, “to know what it took to do that, and then to do that for 141 games, it’s very impressive.”

Gilgeous-Alexander returned the praise. He said Williams, who admitted he had not really played basketball in a while, settled the opener in San Antonio with two quick layups, and on Thursday “felt like the only guy going all night.” “Having a guy like that, that could just go get four points in 20 seconds, it’s game-changing, especially late in games and against the better teams,” he said. “We’re all just lucky to have a guy like that going to war every night.”

Williams had his own scary moment when he went down and kept rolling along the floor. “Everybody gasped, because obviously I had been hurt,” he said. “I thought that was a nice way to ease the tension there.” He added that he had butted Holmgren’s chin on the play. “I’m happy we got a timeout, because I was dizzy. I will never do that again.”

The Thunder, now 2-0, host the LA Clippers on Sunday at 7 p.m. ET, which is 2 a.m. Monday in Cairo. Gilgeous-Alexander’s next 20-point game will be the first of a new streak.