THUNDER WIRE - For most teams, sitting out your best player and several other top contributors for a game is a sign of waving the white flag in favor of rest. For OKC, the second leg of a homeand- road back-to-back signaled to be the grim reaper by ending the opponent’s postseason hopes en route to the NBA’s best record.

It’s been that type of historic season for them. The Oklahoma City Thunder enjoyed a 125-112 win over the Phoenix Suns as both teams had polar opposite motivations. The former had nothing to play for while the latter had everything. You couldn’t tell on the court, though.

“I thought in the first half, they had 67 points. Beal and Booker had 25 shot attempts and they had 10 assists between them. Booker had eight at halftime. They were making every play for that team, and they were really starting to drink,” Thunder head coach Mark Daigneault said. “We went into halftime wanting to be a little more impactful on the ball and then certainly more impactful on the help, knowing that we were going to be pressuring those guys and I thought our execution of that was excellent.”

With their play-in tournament hopes on the line, the Suns needed to win out and get outside help if they wanted to sneak into the postseason. That should be enough to throw their best punches. Instead, a strong start was erased with a sleepy second half that pulled the plug on their aspirations.

To start, the Suns played with the urgency needed for a team’s postseason ticket on the line. They scored points in a flurry. Devin Booker had a hot start after being held in check in his first two games against the Thunder. Phoenix exited the first quarter with a 39-29 lead.

That continued in the second quarter as the Suns led by as many as 15 points. Regular season games usually fall on a spectrum between games played out of necessity and treated as pseudo-playoffs. After such an emotionally taxing win over the Los Angeles Lakers the day before, this one felt like it fell on the indifference side for the Thunder.

The number of players out showed that too. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Lu Dort, Isaiah Hartenstein and Cason Wallace sat out to nurse ailments. That’s four of your six best players. Everything about this game screamed the Thunder wanted to gift it to the Suns. Instead, Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren had different plans.

But then Williams woke up the Thunder from daydreaming. He got in a rhythm and scored on several difficult mid-range looks. He led a 19-7 run to make it a single-digit deficit. The Suns entered halftime with just a 67-62 lead.

It was the exact splash of cold water the Thunder needed. They came out of the halftime break with their batteries fully charged. They scored nine points out of the break to retake the lead. It was Holmgren’s turn to dissect the Suns’ non-existent defense. The seven-footer attacked the basket and got to the free-throw line plenty of times.

Meanwhile, the Suns’ offense was completely shut off. Booker was silenced and Alex Caruso destroyed their offensive flow with a steal every other possession that led to a Thunder fastbreak bucket. Copy and paste that sequence a handful of times and that led to a 43-point third quarter for OKC to exit with a 105-93 lead.

The Thunder kept a double-digit difference the rest of the way and led by as many as 20 points. With their season on the line, the Suns went out with a whimper as their offense resembled a middle school JV squad. It was entirely incoherent, and a lack of a true playmaker fittingly was the knockout punch to a frustrating year.

The Thunder shot 52% from the field and went 12-of-30 (40%) from 3. They shot 23-of-27 on free throws. They had 24 assists on 45 baskets. Six Thunder players scored double-digit points.

Williams led the way with an efficient 33 points. Holmgren stepped up with a 22-point double-double. Caruso had 19 points and five steals. Aaron Wiggins finished with 17 points. Kenrich Williams had 13 points and Jaylin Williams had 12 points off the bench.

Meanwhile, the Suns shot 48% from the field and went 15-of-42 (35.7%) from 3. They shot 13-of-19 on free throws. They had 31 assists on 42 baskets. Six Suns players scored double-digit points.

Booker had 20 points on 9-of-20 shooting and 14 assists. Bradley Beal scored 25 points on 8-of-17 shooting. Ryan Dunn had 13 points and seven rebounds. Off the bench, Collin Gillespie had 17 points, Royce O’Neale had 11 points and Tyus Jones had 10 points.

This game showed the differences between the two franchises. The Suns have felt artificial. They got a new owner and tried to buy their way into a championship.

While they had an impressive roster on paper with household names, they never gelled together. That led to a catastrophic season with massive ramifications on the way.

Meanwhile, the Thunder organically built up their roster. Their top two scorers in this game were homegrown talents. They’ve built a culture similar to the 2010 San Antonio Spurs where a plugand- play system brought out the best of anybody despite several absences. They continue as a winning machine and should enter the playoffs as a title favorite.

“We obviously would like to have homecourt advantage in the playoffs in any circumstance but when we go into the playoffs, we start 0-0 and you have to play and win your first series and that’ll be our focus when we get there,” Daigneault said on clinching the NBA’s best record. “But we certainly would want to try to win as many games as we can. We’d like to have homecourt advantage rather than not but it wasn’t a focal point for us. We’re trying to improve and compete.”