Tyrese Haliburton (left) of the Indiana Pacers and Shai Gilgeous Alexander of Oklahoma City Thunder, protagonists of the NBA final, which starts this Thursday. EFE/ CJ Gunther/ Gerald Leong Archive
Foto: EFE – CJ GUNTHER/ GERALD LEONG
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The PayCom Center by Oklahoma City, a city of just 700,000 inhabitants, hosts since Thursday the grand final of the NBA between the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Indiana Pacers, a crossing of franchises of small markets that have earned, with a brilliant sports direction, the most important showcase of American basketball.
The NBA will crown a new champion after the elimination of the Boston Celtics in the conference semifinals and the new King of the American Basketball League will leave an unprecedented cross between OKC and Pacers.
Oklahoma City, led by the Liga MVP, Shai Gilgeous Alexander, returns to the finals for the first time since 2012, while the Pacers had to wait 25 years to play the ring again in this series for the best of seven games.
The Thunder signed an extraordinary regular season with 68 victories, the fifth best brand in history, and eliminated the Memphis Grizzlies (4-0), the Denver Nuggets (4-3) and the Minnesota Timberwolves (4-1).
The Pacers arrived at the playoffs as fourth serial heads, but fired their competitive level in the postseason and had a triumphal path towards the finals.
Milwaukee Bucks overwhelmed, 4-1 to the Cleveland Cavaliers, the first favorites in the East, and won 4-2 an intense series against the New York Knicks.
Thunder and Pacers, two matagigants in the NBA 2025
Two small market franchises imposed their power against NBA giants full of stars such as the Celtics or Los Angeles Lakers, which incorporated last February into Slovenian Luka Doncic.
The Thunder occupy the twenty -fifth place among the franchises that best pay their players, with a total of 165 million dollars, while the paers are decimoctavos in this classification, with 169 million dollars.
In OKC, Gilgeous Alexander took the MVP of the regular season after leading a young and ambitious team, with protagonists like Chet Holmgren or Jalen Williams. Players of enormous potential incorporated through the draft, whose salaries are respectively of ten and four million in this campaign.
The incorporations of the pivot Isaiah Hartenstein and Alex Caruso have completed the Mark Daigneault template, which starts this final as a favorite.
The Pacers, meanwhile, arrive with Tyrese Haliburton as a figure and with a very united and powerful group in which eaves and pivots such as Pascal Siakam and Myles Turner or a brilliant triple pitcher like Andrew Nembhard stand out.
The Thunder begin the series with field advantage, so they would play at home a hypothetical seventh game.
OKC will house the first two meetings of the series, before moving to Indianapolis for parties three and four. From that moment on, if necessary, it will be played alternately in Oklahoma City, Indianapolis and, finally, in Oklahoma City.
The Pacers were never NBA champions, while the Thunder is recognized the 1979 title conquered when the franchise was in Seattle with the name Supersonics.
Time and where to see the first game of the NBA final
The series begins this Thursday, June 5, 2025 and will be seen in Colombia through ESPN and Disney+, from 7:00 pm
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