OKC Thunder Listed No. 6 in Latest ESPN NBA Power Rankings

In ESPN's weekly NBA Power Rankings, the Oklahoma City Thunder landed at No. 6 for the week of Dec. 20.

In the latest iteration of ESPN's NBA Power Rankings, the Thunder was able to find itself at the No. 6 spot — a spot lower than the week prior. 

It's been a strenuous past four weeks for Oklahoma City, but Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and co. continue to find different paths to claim wins against some of the most competitive teams across the league.

Though they've still dealt with losses to the likes of the Philadelphia 76ers and Minnesota Timberwolves in late November, the subsequent victories over the Los Angeles Lakers, Dallas Mavericks and Denver Nuggets have helped identify the lengths this Thunder team could go within this season. 

Even in those losses, Oklahoma City was in the fight — combine the team's consistency, talent and overall cohesive production, it's easy to see why ESPN has ranked the Thunder within the top ten in its' power rankings since early November.

All fans and media members had to go off to envision this year's version of the Thunder was a 40-42 record a year ago, where players did flash their upside and potential within this unit.

It was seemingly known Oklahoma City would be a good basketball team — but it most certainly wasn't known to this extent.

The impact of a rim-protecting and offensively versatile 7-foot-1 forward in Chet Holmgren, Gilgeous-Alexander taking yet another leap, and Jalen William fortifying himself as a true, befitting piece to its' young core, Oklahoma City is now appearing as a legit contender in the West.

It's getting hard to dispute the other side — sitting with a 17-8 record and at No. 2 in the conference — a healthy Thunder team holds the capability to beat any team in the league, which was clearly not the case in 2022-23.

This is backed by its fairly tough early season schedule, and especially by Oklahoma City's one-point win against the defending NBA Champions in the Nuggets on the road Saturday night.

As the Thunder continue to be tested, it's been shown that they can arise to the occasion.

And with the Clippers, Timberwolves, Lakers, Nuggets and New York Knicks all lined up throughout Oklahoma City's schedule beginning Thursday night, these key games will remain another test of many to the Thunder's validity as a Western Conference contender.

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