Oklahoma City Thunder star Jalen Williams was taken off the court on a stretcher late in the fourth quarter of a 108-101 win over the Los Angeles Clippers after suffering what figures to be a severe lower leg injury. 

With just over a minute to play, Williams drove to the basket and tried to go up for a dunk. He was sandwiched in mid-air by Kris Dunn and Derrick Jones Jr., which caused him to lose his balance. When he landed, his left leg got trapped underneath the weight of his entire body and the lower part of it appeared to break in the wrong direction. 

The Thunder training staff immediately covered his leg with towels as his teammates looked on in distress. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander pulled his own jersey up over his face as Williams' leg was placed into an air cast and he was loaded onto a stretcher. 

"We're not doing great. That's tough on the guys," Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said during his postgame press conference. He did not have any specifics to share on the nature of the injury. 

Williams gave the crowd a thumbs up as he was wheeled off the court, but there's a good chance that he is done for the season. 

Williams was coming off season derailed by injuries

Williams emerged as a true star in 2025, when he made his first All-Star appearance, and earned a spot on the All-NBA Third Team and the All-Defensive Second Team before helping Gilgeous-Alexander lead the Thunder to their first title since moving to Oklahoma City. Williams averaged 23.6 points in the 2025 Finals and had a playoff-career-high 40 points to lead the Thunder to a Game 5 win that gave them a 3-2 series lead over the Pacers (OKC won in seven games). 

He played through a wrist injury during the 2025 playoffs, however, and underwent surgery last summer to fix the problem, which kept him sidelined for the first 19 games of last season. Less than two months into his return, he strained his right hamstring and was sidelined for multiple weeks. He came back, played two games, then tweaked his hamstring again and missed another six weeks. 

Williams returned shortly before the playoffs last season, but suffered a left hamstring strain in Game 2 of the Thunder's first-round series with the Phoenix Suns. He sat out the rest of that series and missed the entire second round before coming back for the Western Conference Finals against the Spurs. After a stellar Game 1, he tweaked his left hamstring again in Game 2 and only played 10 more minutes the rest of the series. 

When the Thunder lost Game 7 to the Spurs, when ended their repeat quest, he was forced to watch from the bench in street clothes. 

Williams' injury a major blow to Thunder's title chances

The Thunder made some moves around the margins this offseason, but brought back their entire core and hoped to make another run at the title in a top-heavy Western Conference. Vegas oddsmakers agreed, tabbing OKC as the shortest favorite to win the NBA Finals. Williams' injury is a major blow to those chances. 

CBS Sports ranked Williams as the 20th-best player in the NBA. 

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