Oklahoma City Thunder forward Jalen Williams made his return from injury on Thursday after missing three games with a left hamstring strain during the postseason.
Williams came off the bench for the first time since December 22, marking a significant shift in his role during a critical playoff run.
He scored just a single point across 10 minutes of action, also committing a pair of turnovers in a difficult night at both ends of the floor.
Oklahoma City were outscored by 18 points during the time Williams spent on the floor, contributing to a heavy 118-91 defeat overall.
Williams did not address the media after the game, but head coach Mark Daigneault stepped forward to offer a firm defence of his player.
“He’s obviously not 100%,” Daigneault said. “He didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t know what to expect. So it was a matter of getting him out there in kind of an insulated role and see what he can bring to the team.”
Daigneault went further in his praise for the 25-year-old, highlighting the effort Williams showed simply by taking to the floor in his condition.
“He’s an All-Star player, he’s an All-NBA player. He hasn’t done a full return to play (protocol) like he would if this was the regular season, and yet he just wants to do whatever he can to try to contribute whatever he can to the team. I give him a lot of credit to get himself out there. He did the best he could. He’s certainly not the reason we lost.”
Williams had already missed 26 of 28 games between January 19 and March 21 due to right hamstring problems before suffering the left hamstring strain in Game 2 of the first-round series against Phoenix.
He returned ahead of the Western Conference Finals but re-injured the same left hamstring in Game 2 last Wednesday, forcing him back to the sidelines once more.
Oklahoma City has gone 8-1 in playoff games during which Williams has been inactive, though seven of those wins came with Ajay Mitchell in the starting lineup.
Mitchell himself has been sidelined for the past three games against San Antonio due to a right soleus strain, during which the Thunder have suffered losses of 21 and 27 points.
Daigneault admitted after Thursday’s defeat that he remains uncertain about what role Williams will play in Game 7 on Saturday against the Spurs.
“There’s a lot of conversations to be had,” Daigneault said. “I don’t have any information about how he came out of the game. Relative to the situation, I thought he looked pretty good, but we’ll see how he feels. We’ll huddle back up and do everything we can to get him ready and then take it from there.”
