Indiana Pacers @ Oklahoma City Thunder
Monday, June 16, 2025 at 8:30 PM ET
Paycom Center, Oklahoma City, OK | Game ID: 42400405
Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Final
OKC 32 27 28 33 120IND 22 23 34 30 109
ESPN UpdateESPN Update
Game 5: Williams scores 40 points and Thunder win 120-109 for a 3-2 NBA Finals lead over Pacers
OKLAHOMA CITY -- — Game 5 was starting to look like Game 1 all over again. Oklahoma City, at home, takes a huge lead. Indiana comes roaring back in the fourth quarter.
Indiana won that one.
This time, the Thunder crafted a different ending — and a 3-2 lead in the NBA Finals was their reward.
Jalen Williams scored a career playoff-high 40 points, MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander added 31 and the Thunder moved one win from a title by beating the Pacers 120-109 on Monday night.
“We're learning,” said Williams, whose previous playoff best was 34.
It was the 10th — and by far, the biggest — time the Thunder stars combined for more than 70 points in a game. Williams was 14 of 24 from the field, and Gilgeous-Alexander added 10 assists.
“It wasn't a perfect game at all and there's a lot of room for growth,” Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said. “But our improvement from Game 4 to Game 5 was critical.”
Pascal Siakam had 28 points for Indiana, which will host Game 6 on Thursday night. TJ McConnell added 18 for the Pacers, who whittled an 18-point deficit down to two in the fourth — then watched the Thunder pull away again, and for good.
“It kind of went away from us,” Siakam said. “But the fight was there.”
It was, but now everything favors the Thunder.
Teams that win Game 5 of an NBA Finals that was tied at 2-2 have gone on to win the series 23 times in 31 previous opportunities, or 74%. And teams with a 3-2 lead in the finals have won 40 times in 49 previous opportunities, or 82%.
But Game 5 was not easy. Far from it.
Down by 18 late in the second quarter, the Pacers — the comeback kings of these playoffs, with as many wins in this postseason from 15 points down or more (five) than the rest of the league has combined, including in Game 1 of this series — did what they do, chipping away. And they did it with Tyrese Haliburton reduced to basically playing decoy on offense because of a leg issue that he aggravated in the first quarter.
“He's not 100%,” Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said. “It's pretty clear.”
Led by McConnell, who scored 13 points in just under seven minutes of the third, the Pacers got within five late in that quarter.
Then, Siakam went to work — a pair of free throws with 9:19 left got Indiana within four, then a 3-pointer about a minute later made it 95-93. In the play-by-play era of the NBA, starting with the 1997 playoffs, teams with leads of 15 points or more in the finals were 80-9.
Make that 81-9 now, and the Thunder are one win away from giving Oklahoma City its first NBA title.
“That was honestly the same exact game as Game 1,” Williams said. “Learning through these finals, that's what makes a team good.”
One more win, and his team will be certified as great.
Who is who
the initials in the Players column
INDAN A. Nembhard
AN A. Nesmith
BM B. Mathurin
BS B. Sheppard
JF J. Furphy
MT M. Turner
OT O. Toppin
PS P. Siakam
TB T. Bradley
TB T. Bryant
TH T. Haliburton
TM T. McConnell
OKCAC A. Caruso
AW A. Wiggins
CH C. Holmgren
CW C. Wallace
IH I. Hartenstein
JW J. Williams
JW Jal. Williams
KW K. Williams
LD L. Dort
SG S. Gilgeous-Alexander
IND/OKC the team itself, not a player
-- the feed named nobody
What
What happened
the codes in the Events column
M2 / M3 made 2 / made 3
X2 / X3 missed 2 / missed 3
FT / X1 free throw made / missed
AST assist
OR / DR offensive / defensive rebound
STL steal
BLK block
TO turnover
FL foul
OF offensive foul — ends the possession
VIOL violation
JUMP jump ball
TM timeout
IR instant replay
HE heave at the buzzer, filed to the team
Where
Where a shot came from
the middle field of M3.LW.25
RM at the rim inside 4 ft
RC right corner
RW right wing
SO straight on
LW left wing
LC left corner
M3.LW.25 made 3, left wing, 25 ft
X2.RM.01 missed 2, at the rim, 1 ft
When
When it happened
the Offset column
one number per event, in the Events order:
whole seconds from the start of the
possession to that event
Events FL X3.RC.23 OR M2.RM.01
Offset 0 18 22 24
the foul opens the possession at 0s;
the putback ends it at 24s, which is
the possession's own Dur