Jalen Williams reflects on crazy comeback win streak from 73-point loss

Oklahoma. and home – Oklahoma City Thunder All-Star Jalen Williams will never take a win for granted and reminded his teammates to do the same as he reflects on his team’s worst loss in franchise history. After a 138-89 victory over the Phoenix Suns in the quarterfinals of the NBA Cup, extending the Thunder’s winning streak to 16the reporter asked Williams if stringing wins ever became routine for the defending champion.

While Williams, selected 12th overall by the Thunder in the 2022 draft, was still in college when the Memphis Grizzlies beat Oklahoma City by 73 points (152-79), a 2021 loss. seemingly stayed with him after all these years.

“Winning is never boring because there were times when some players on our team were let down. I won’t name names, but we lost by 70,” Williams said. “So I think a lot of guys have that in the back of their minds — even me, my freshman year. We didn’t win a ton. We were solid. I think I have that in the back of my mind. You can get bored with the process.

“I think the lineup we had at the end of the game, to see how they can play is a little more motivation as well. They work really hard behind the scenes. So to get a chance to go into these NBA games and kind of show what they’ve been doing is a little more motivation as well.”

The Thunder’s 73-point loss, which occurred in a regular-season game on December 2, 2021, is the largest loss in NBA history. However, as Jaylen Williams alluded to, the Thunder’s deep bench makes it easy for starters to want to build a big enough cushion for the third-string guys to play the fourth quarter.

“We’re just playing hard. Not all of these games are going to be missed. We’re not taking them for granted either,” Williams added. “A win is a win. We’re going to take ugly wins. We’re going to take nice wins. Just how much better can we go into winning because we’ve had a couple of setbacks where we’re not really happy with how we’ve won. And we’ve got games where it’s close and we like the way we’ve played. So basketball is about winning. You can win.”

Jaylen Williams was asked if he ever gets tired of being a part of so many Thunder wins: “Winning is never boring because some guys on our team used to get blown out…

We lost by 70. I think a lot of guys have that in the back of their minds” pic.twitter.com/1EhMebb8tF

— Joshua Pavon (@joe_svai) December 11, 2025

With Jaylen Williams and the Thunder winning all but one of their first 25 regular season games, Oklahoma City doesn’t appear to be slowing down their winning ways anytime soon.

Why Mark Daigneault isn’t focused on the Thunder’s winning streak

Thunder head coach Marc Daigneault reacted to his team’s 16-game winning streak discovering what was crucial to its maintenance.

“Not focusing on the streak,” Daigneault said. “You just have to play the next possession, be better the next day, win the next quarter and compete in the next game. If you do that and you’re present in the process, sometimes you look up and you get a certain amount of games in a row. But we definitely have to realize that we still have a lot of improvement. We have a lot of things to maintain and challenge.

“We have a long season ahead of us. But the guys have done a great job of staying very present in the season, so far, competing at this point, and that has put us in a good position,” Daigneault concluded.

The Thunder will look to improve to 25-1 and advance to the NBA Finals when they face the Spurs on Saturday in Las Vegas.