Pacers vs. Thunder NBA Finals: Alex Caruso has been giving OKC a little bit of everything — including a lot more minutes
OKLAHOMA CITY — Through the first seven and a half months of this NBA season, Alex Caruso had only topped 30 minutes in a game twice.
The first: a late-March meeting with the Los Angeles Clippers, when injuries to Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren pressed him into duty in the Thunder's starting lineup. The second: Game 4 of the 2024 Western Conference finals, when the veteran super-sub skittered all over the court, guarding Anthony Edwards, Rudy Gobert and every Timberwolf in between in a hard-fought 128-126 win that drew Oklahoma City within one win of the 2025 NBA Finals.
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Now that the Thunder are actually in the 2025 NBA Finals, though? Caruso has played 30-plus twice in four Finals games — the last two, now that you mention it.
As the philosopher once said, 'There are no coincidences.'
That philosopher's name? Alex Caruso.
Oklahoma City Thunder guard Alex Caruso has risen to the occasion in the NBA Finals. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy)
(ASSOCIATED PRESS)
Caruso cracking 30 minutes just twice in his first 72 appearances this regular- and postseason was emblematic of the Thunder's big-picture plan of attack for a player they'd targeted in a key trade last summer to be the missing piece of a hoped-for championship puzzle … but also a player whose now-legendary relentlessness had led to multiple injuries that cost him significant time over the course of his seven-year NBA career.
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'Yeah, I mean, it's a double-edged sword,' Caruso said after Oklahoma City's Game 2 win. 'Some of that is I play a pretty erratic style regardless if it's Game 1 [of the season] or if it's Game 2 of the Finals. I just only have one gear — I don't know how to play at 75%. Some of that was keeping me out of my own way, out of harm's way. I don't do a good job of that on my own.'
Some of it, though, came down to Oklahoma City being friggin' awesome, with a ton of dudes capable of contributing when given the chance.
'We won 68 games in the regular season,' Caruso said after Game 2.' We had a 12-, 13-man rotation through the year, depending on who was hurt, different teams we played. That just comes with the nature of having a really good, deep team.'
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The Finals have a way of winnowing down a team's depth, though — of erasing the opportunities to see what a precocious rookie might be able to provide you, of rendering more limited contributors particularly vulnerable and thus unviable, of paring a team down to its most essential elements.
'It's the ultimate effort, endeavor, whatever you want to call it,' Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said after Game 4. 'I mean, it's long. It's arduous. But it's the greatest opportunity going. … It's really hard, and it's supposed to be hard.'
It's a crucible: a 24/7 stress test that spotlights and punishes weakness, and that rewards versatility and skill, a game without holes, and an iron constitution.
In other words: It's a series built for Caruso, and that Caruso is built for.
'Yeah, you know, I'm a complete basketball player,' he said Sunday. 'There's a lot of things that I do really, really good.'
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Caruso showcased the diversity of his skill-set in Game 4. Everybody knows, at this point, that he's one of the best defenders on the planet, equally adept at chasing jitterbug guards around screens and aggressively bodying up Nikola Jokić in the post. What many might not have been aware of, though, was that he's also a more-than-capable initiator of Oklahoma City's offense, with more touches and time of possession than any Thunderer besides Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams in Game 4, and with more passes thrown than even OKC's two on-ball All-Stars.
Or that, when the moment calls for it, he's got enough shake to his handle to be able to get from Point A to Point B off the bounce and make something happen once he gets there:
'Over my career, my abilities have gotten better through some work ethic and a little bit of confidence and understanding the moment and having success in the moment,' Caruso said after Game 4. '... This series — this playoffs, really — teams are forcing me to try and score the ball. That's something that I've been working on for the last three, four years of my offseason. It's been long offseasons not in the playoffs, so I've had a lot of time to work and prepare.'
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That preparation, combined with countless catch-and-shoot reps that have turned him into a 43.2% marksman from 3-point range in this postseason, makes Caruso a legitimate complementary offensive threat playing off the likes of Gilgeous-Alexander, Williams and Chet Holmgren. And that, combined with his ability to defend all across the positional spectrum — and his propensity for wreaking havoc while doing so, in the form of steals, deflections, blocked shots and blown-up possessions — makes him an exceptionally additive player in just about any context you could conjure.
'He is a gamer — you plug him in anywhere, any lineup, feels like any group, he makes a difference,' Gilgeous-Alexander said Sunday. 'Makes everyone else around him better. He is always talking. He always knows where we're supposed to be, where the other team is supposed to be. He has instincts that are special. I don't think you can teach things like that. He just knows where the ball is going, where a rebound is bouncing to, how to get a deflection, timely steals.'
That all-around difference was palpable late in Game 4. Caruso contributed a little bit of everything — strong shot contests, aggressive rebounding on both ends, smart cuts, timely help rotations, excellent on-ball defense — as part of the small-ball defensive look Pacers star Tyrese Haliburton said 'got us stagnant there,' and helped set the table for the comeback effort that got OKC even in the best-of-seven series:
'He has a championship ring for a reason,' Gilgeous-Alexander said after Game 4. 'It's no coincidence. He knows what it takes. He put the work in. He's proving it every night.'
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Caruso has proven plenty for Oklahoma City, both over the course of the season and in this series, where he has the best on-court/off-court splits of any Thunder rotation regular besides Holmgren. In a gotta-have-it Game 4, Oklahoma City outscored Indiana by 14 points in Caruso's 30 minutes; through four games, 17 of 26 Thunder lineups that have outscored the Pacers have included Caruso.
'He just has amazing feel for the game and is an insane competitor,' Gilgeous-Alexander said Sunday. 'I think you add those two things together, and no matter where you drop him in the world, any basketball game, he is going to make a difference.'
The question facing Daigneault and his coaching staff heading into Game 5 of a 2-2 series: Could Caruso make an even bigger difference in even bigger minutes? Like … for example … starter's minutes?
Daigneault's proven very willing to tinker with his starting lineup, shifting away from a more traditional two-big look with Isaiah Hartenstein alongside Holmgren before the series in favor of moving Cason Wallace into the first five to better match speed on the perimeter with Haliburton, Andrew Nembhard and Indiana's high-octane ball- and player-movement game. Daigneault then shifted back to the double-big unit for Game 4, as part of a reorientation of Oklahoma City's rotation and substitution pattern aimed partly at counteracting the Pacers' defensive strategy on Gilgeous-Alexander, thus ensuring the MVP had a bit more gas in the tank come crunch time than he had in Game 3. (Mission accomplished.)
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'Every game is different,' Daigneault said Sunday. 'Like, we've done it after wins, after losses, throughout these series — we move things around pretty quickly to try to stay unpredictable and also try to scrape for every advantage we can in what turn out to be close games.'
Few players in the league are better equipped to scrape out those advantages than Caruso, and with the Finals knotted up and a title just two wins away, Daigneault sounded Sunday like a coach prepared to lean even harder in his direction.
'I think this is the time you've got to do everything you can to try to win the games and pull out all the stops. That's been the mentality,' he said. 'He's been great. Extra rest in the Finals for all the players is a consideration, and you get a lot of rest between games. There's advantages and disadvantages. But one of the advantages is for everybody to recover and be as fresh as possible going into the game.'
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With an extra day of rest between Games 4 and 5, and with a shot at a second date with the Larry O'Brien Championship Trophy getting closer by the possession, Caruso plans to be ready to put his fingerprints on the game, no matter how many minutes Daigneault needs him to play come Monday night in Bricktown.
'These are the games you are judged on … this is the time of year that I live for,' Caruso said Sunday. 'This is the time of the year where games matter, stakes are high, wins and losses are more important. So being prepared for this is important.'
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