Durant says former team Oklahoma City Thunder has 'bright future'

Kevin Durant’s first Suns home game on Wednesday night against the Oklahoma City Thunder brings some nostalgia to longtime fans of his illustrious career.

After he was drafted by the Seattle Supersonics out of Texas in 2007, the team moved to Oklahoma City the following year and Durant rose to stardom as a perennial All-Star.

Durant and his former teammates Russell Westbrook and James Harden led the Thunder to the 2012 finals but lost to the LeBron James-led Miami Heat. Two years later, he won the league’s MVP and gave his memorable emotional speech during that award’s ceremony about his mother’s financial struggles and sacrifices for him and his brother, calling thr the now oft-used phrase “The real MVP.”

Then Durant made a polarizing decision to leave the Thunder in free agency for the Golden State Warriors in July 2016 after they came back from a 3-1 deficit to beat Oklahoma City in that year’s Western conference semifinals. And he earned Finals MVP the next two years as Golden State won consecutive NBA championships.

Oklahoma City didn’t get past the postseason’s first round from 2017 through 2020, and missed the playoffs the past two season. They’ve been rebuilding with a boatload of first-round draft picks acquired from trading their All-Stars Paul George and Westbrook to the Los Angeles Clippers and Houston Rockets in July 2019, respectively, and Chris Paul to the Phoenix Suns in November 2020.

But this season, the Thunder has the NBA’s youngest roster and are a competitive team. They enter Wednesday’s game on a three-game win streak, have a three-way tie with New Orleans and Portland at 31-34 for the West’s 10th place, the final spot for the postseason play-in tournament.

“A young team that got a bright future. You got some potential up and down the lineup, guys that can be impact players in this league, a front office and coaching staff that understands what that’s like developing players. So the last couple years they’ve been trending in the right direction and I feel like their working their way to being a playoff team.”

There are some parallels between the current Thunder team and Durant as one of the league’s best scorers during early days with that team.

Oklahoma City has All-Star guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who’s fifth in scoring and tied with Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo averaging 31.2 points per game. Alexander is also fourth in steals (1.7), tied with fellow All-Stars in Indiana’s Tyrese Haliburton and Minnesota’s Anthony Edwards.

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