OKLAHOMA CITY — Wilt Chamberlain owns a myriad of laughably improbable records. As of Monday night, one is in serious jeopardy of being broken.
With a 3-pointer in the third quarter, Oklahoma City Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander extended his streak of consecutive regular-season 20-point games to 126, tying the mark Chamberlain has held since 1963. Gilgeous-Alexander last scored fewer than 20 points in a regular-season game on Oct. 30, 2024, when he had 18 in a 105-93 home win against the San Antonio Spurs.
Gilgeous-Alexander, the reigning NBA MVP, had 17 points by halftime Monday. He finished with 35 points in a 129-126 win over the Denver Nuggets. The Thunder, currently atop the West, are 43-11 with SGA in the lineup this season. He has become renowned for his consistency as a scorer and offensive juggernaut. Look no further than this feat.
He began this streak on Nov. 1, 2024, and has held it for 493 days before coming face-to-face with Chamberlain’s tally. Since that November night early in the Thunder’s championship campaign, Gilgeous-Alexander has become a scoring champion, an NBA champion and NBA Finals MVP in addition to being league MVP. He was averaging 31.6 points this season entering Monday’s game.
After the matchup, Nikola Jokić, who made his own history earlier this season by surpassing Oscar Robertson for the second-most triple-doubles in NBA history, lauded SGA’s latest accomplishment after the MVP candidates dueled to the buzzer.
“I don’t know that people know how hard it is to do that,” Jokić said of SGA tying Chamberlain. “To make 20 points in 10 (straight) games, not 120, whatever it is, it’s special. He’s a special player.”
Before Gilgeous-Alexander thrust himself into the second-longest streak, the closest player before him was … Chamberlain. Days after the center’s record-setting 126-game mark was severed by an early ejection, Chamberlain rattled off another run, scoring at least 20 points for 92 consecutive games between February 1963 and March 1964.
The next longest streak? Robertson had 79 consecutive games with 20 or more points. Michael Jordan and Kevin Durant got to 72. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar had a streak of 71 games. Kobe Bryant made it to 63.
Regarding active players and streaks, LeBron James had 49 consecutive games of 20 points or more from Dec. 14, 2007, to March 26, 2008, with the Cleveland Cavaliers, according to Basketball Reference. LA Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard entered Monday night with 41 consecutive 20-point games, a streak he began on Nov. 28.
Gilgeous-Alexander’s 20-point streak — which only counts regular-season games, as he scored below 20 three times in last season’s playoff run — is a reflection of his consistency. While Gilgeous-Alexander’s 32.5-point average during the run is far below the 49.2 points Chamberlain averaged during his 126-game streak, the Thunder star did it while averaging fewer than 34 minutes per contest. Chamberlain, on the other hand, almost always played the entire game; his 48.4 minutes-per-game average during the streak included a handful of overtime finishes.
Prior to Monday, Gilgeous-Alexander was rarely in peril of seeing his streak end. He has tended to get his buckets in by the third quarter, then sit out large stretches of the fourth as the Thunder routed their opponent. He has scored fewer than 25 points just 13 times during the 126-game run, though four of those instances occurred after the calendar turned to 2026. He also scored his 20th point before the fourth quarter in all but 11 games, and only twice needed to get his 20th point in the last three minutes.
Most of Gilgeous-Alexander’s closest calls came earlier this season. It took until the 1:34 mark for him to get his 20th point in the Thunder’s season-opening, double-overtime win against the Houston Rockets, though he took over the extra periods to finish with 35. A month later, Gilgeous-Alexander had just 16 points against the Portland Trail Blazers when he checked in at the 5:53 mark of the fourth quarter, but scored 10 more down the stretch to lead the Thunder to victory.
The streak nearly ended on Jan. 15 in a rematch against the Rockets. Houston swarmed Gilgeous-Alexander throughout the night, but the MVP obliged by finding his open teammates. The Thunder led by 16 with 4:14 left, but Gilgeous-Alexander only had 16 points. He got his 17th at the free-throw line after a Rockets technical foul, missed a pull-up jumper over two defenders on the next possession, then made it to the 20-point mark by drawing back-to-back fouls and hitting three of four free throws. The last two, with 3:05 remaining in the fourth quarter, came after the Rockets had pulled their starters.
That was a rare instance during this run where Gilgeous-Alexander appeared to play outside the flow of the game to keep his streak alive. In nearly every other case, he got past the 20-point mark with little fanfare. Monday’s game was a different case, though, given its back-and-forth nature thanks to SGA and Jokić trading clutch-time buckets as the matchup concluded. After the game, SGA reflected on what he accomplished by being in the same breath as Wilt Chamberlain.
“I don’t know. It’s still a lot to even wrap my head around,” the reigning MVP told the media Monday. “To be honest with you, I try not to even think about it, especially during the season. So much is going on. So many things have to go right for you to get what you ultimately want. And that gets 100 percent of my focus, especially basketball-wise. But obviously, being in a conversation with a guy like that is special. It’s crazy to think that where I was 10 years ago, I’d be here today. You work hard, you trust the process and you look up, and great things can happen for you. I’m a testament to that.”
Gilgeous-Alexander, through his play, has proved to deliver at least 20 points every night for almost two full regular seasons. One more night, and he’ll accomplish the unthinkable: snatching a statistical crown from Chamberlain.
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