The Oklahoma City Thunder are about to get whole again at the worst possible time for the rest of the league. Jalen Williams is back.
The defending champions listed Williams as available for Game 1 of the Western Conference Finals against the San Antonio Spurs at Paycom Center. The 2025 All-Star forward had not played for Oklahoma City since April 22 due to a Grade 1 hamstring strain, missing six total playoff games before being cleared.
By tip-off, Williams will be just under four weeks removed from the injury. That timeline lines up with everything the Thunder said publicly. Williams is in the lineup, and Oklahoma City just got considerably scarier.
Why This Matters
Williams, 26, was a massive part of the Thunder’s 2025 championship run. He averaged 21.6 points, 5.3 rebounds, and 5.1 assists during last year’s title push and earned All-Star, All-Defensive, and All-NBA nods along the way. He is the player who lets Shai Gilgeous-Alexander operate without being the only creator on the floor.
His 2025-26 season has been a mess. Williams underwent offseason wrist surgery after the title run and did not make his season debut until late November. He has dealt with hamstring injuries in both legs and has appeared in just 35 total games across the regular season and playoffs.
The Thunder somehow kept rolling without him. Reserve guard Ajay Mitchell stepped into a larger role and averaged 18.8 points, 4.0 rebounds, and 4.9 assists in the 2026 playoffs. He gave Oklahoma City a stabilizing presence while Gilgeous-Alexander carried the scoring load.
The Wembanyama Test
The timing of Williams’ return matters even more after what happened in San Antonio’s path to the Western Conference Finals. Victor Wembanyama put up a 41-point, 24-rebound performance in a double-overtime win that left the league wondering whether anybody can slow him down at this point in the postseason.
Williams is the closest thing the Thunder have to a multipositional answer for that problem. He can switch, contest at the rim, and trade buckets with elite scorers when the defensive matchups force it. Without him, Oklahoma City would have been trying to figure out how to deal with Wembanyama on the fly. With him, they have a real plan.
What This Says About the Series
The Thunder were never going to roll over against the Spurs. San Antonio is younger, hungrier, and just took down the No. 2 seed Minnesota Timberwolves in Game 6 of the previous round to get here. The Spurs also caught a break with De’Aaron Fox ruled out of Game 1 with right ankle soreness.
Now Oklahoma City answers with its own starpower update. Williams is back, the reigning MVP is the reigning MVP, and the Thunder finally have their full closing lineup available. That is a problem for every team still standing.
San Antonio fans should not panic, but they should be honest. The Spurs were getting a banged-up version of the Thunder for two months. They are about to find out what the real one looks like.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
