ALEX Caruso has embraced the role of elder statesman and leader of the youthful Oklahoma City Thunder as they head to the 2025 NBA Finals.
Caruso, 30, won an NBA title as in a Los Angeles Lakers team led by LeBron James and Anthony Davis. Now he's eyeing another title with a young group of guys led by newly-minted MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander that made tremendous progress this season.
The Thunder will face the Indiana Pacers in the NBA Finals starting on Thursday (Friday Manila time).
“Over the year, I’ve gotten to know them really well and I’m very close just going through the battles of the regular season and in the playoffs now with them. Even for being a young team, there is a mental and emotional maturity within the game that they possess that has been honed and been drilled into them since they've been here,” Caruso said in a media availability with US-based and international reporters on Sunday.
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“But also just some natural competitiveness that goes with that. That’s made it really easy for me to just fall in line, just do what I do best, which is play hard and play for the team. I think what makes them special is their ability to process things and learn so quickly.
“A lot of times with young teams in the NBA, there is a learning curve that is much longer and not quite as sharp that I think we’ve been able to fast track and facilitate just the ability to progress.
"It’s a shout out to the coaches and the organization for allowing the guys to flourish in a good environment, a group of special guys that are willing to sacrifice, they’re willing to learn, they want to get better, they have the desire to grow,” said Caruso.
But more than the roles of SGA, Jaylen Williams, Chet Holmgren, and the others to their title push, Oklahoma City Thunder coach Mark Daigneault expressed the importance of Caruso in the team especially in the leadership aspect.
“He is vocal. He shares his wisdom. The guys listen,” said Daigneault of Caruso. “Kenrich Williams is another guy who I think just has a very outsized voice in our locker room. As flat as our locker room is, those two guys definitely have a lot of credibility.”
Daignaeult said Caruso leads by example by being invested in every aspect of the game.
“There’s never a second that he is not inside the team and there’s never a second where he is not engaged in the competition and fully engaged in the competition,” said Daigneault, who already coached Caruso back in their days with the Oklahoma City Blue in the NBA G League.
“And I think that right there, the contagiousness of that and the consistency of that is really the impact is it doesn’t matter if it’s a drill and shootaround or whether it’s a side out of bounds play on a short shotclock, that guy Alex Caruso is completely engaged in that moment, and ultimately, your best, competitively, happens in the moment and no one embodies that as consistently as well as him.”
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