Thunder Training Camp Opens Up With Excitement in Day One

The Oklahoma City Thunder opened up training camp with excitement yet professionalism.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is pictured during the Thunder media day at the Paycom Center in Oklahoma City, on Monday, Sept. 30, 2024. / NATHAN J. FISH/THE OKLAHOMAN / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

The balls bounced in Thunder ION for the first time this season in an official capacity. The Oklahoma City Thunder opened up their training camp in what was described as an exciting first day.

"It was fun, we got up and down a lot, what we expected, .we competed. Good first day. Little bit of rust, turnovers, stuff like that. But it was good to respond [with how] the guys competed," Superstar Shai Gilgeous-Alexander said following Tuesday's practice.

While the first day of camp is a small sample size, there is still value in each rep given. The Thunder's leader mentioned how valuable this time is to lay the foundation for what they hope is a successful season.

"Making sure we play together, making sure we compete together, making sure we just keep building our camaraderie on and off the court. I think that is big for us," Gilgeous-Alexander said.

Though, no one needs to sell the Thunder on taking training camp series, as bench boss Mark Daigneault pointed out, this is a professional group.

“This is a very easy team to coach because they’re serious professionals, they love the game, they want to compete and do it inside the team. There’s really nothing you bring to them that feels like a sales job," Daigneault said of this group after day one.

Gilgeous-Alexander described how the teams broke down and relaid that the Thunder used four teams all comprised of ball-handlers, shooters, defenders and bigs which shows the organizational depth to pull that off.

Though, the Thunder are so good they had to trot out split squads that would make the folks in Surprise, Arizona happy to see as if it was a March Spring Training date. As Alex Caruso pointed out, not breaking into groups would have made things pretty unfair for the offense.

"I am looking forward to it. Today, Me and [Aaron Wiggins] were the two main guys on our team defending the ball. I played with [Cason Wallace] a handful of times leading up to training camp and Lu [Dort] a couple times. I know what they bring, they know what I bring," Caruso Said "We have to make sure we get stuff done in training camp so we can't put everybody on the same team or else that might be a difficult time on the offense to execute."

The defense ace couldn't help but crack a smile when discussing the potential the Thunder posses on the defensive side of the floor.

It was all smiles on day one as Caruso even took a stab at impersonating Mark Daigneault's famous squint and Gilgeous-Alexander smiled ear-to-ear discussing the competitiveness of camp as well as the newest addition in Isaiah Hartenstein who was on Gilgeous-Alexander's team for day one.

Thunder Training Camp Day 1 pic.twitter.com/JBbnaqqvUr

— Rylan Stiles (@Rylan_Stiles) October 1, 2024

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