Shai Gilgeous-Alexander wins NBA's Clutch Player of the Year award

We already knew that Shai Gilgeous-Alexander was valuable. Now he’s certified clutch.

The NBA announced on Tuesday that Gilgeous-Alexander is the winner of the 2025-26 Clutch Player of the Year award.

The honor is the third major individual award for the Oklahoma City guard, who was named league MVP and Finals MVP last season while leading the Thunder to their first NBA championship. Gilgeous-Alexander is also a finalist alongside three-time MVP Nikola Jokić and newly crowned Defensive Player of the Year Victor Wembanyama for this season’s MVP.

Gilgeous-Alexander was named CPOY over fellow finalists Jamal Murray and Anthony Edwards. The award is the newest of the NBA’s seven major end-of-season offerings and comes with the Jerry West trophy.

“To get this award, you have to help your team win games late,” Gilgeous-Alexander told NBC after winning the award. “That’s what I’m after most more than anything, is winning games.

“My teammates trust me. My coaches trust me to put the ball in my hands in those positions. I try my best to deliver night in and night out, and I did enough of it this year.”

De'Aaron Fox won the inaugural CPOY in 2022-23, and Stephen Curry and Jalen Brunson have won it since. Gilgeous-Alexander is now the fourth All-Star guard to win CPOY, which the NBA awards to the “player who best comes through for his teammates late in close games.”

Add Clutch Player of the Year to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander's increasingly crowded trophy collection.

(IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect / REUTERS)

What makes SGA ‘clutch’

Gilgeous-Alexander led the NBA with 175 points in clutch situations, which are defined as the final five minutes of the fourth quarter or overtime when the score is within five points. He did so while playing in just 27 games with clutch situations due in part to Oklahoma’s City’s NBA-best plus-11.1 average point differential.

But when the Thunder needed clutch scoring, Gilgeous-Alexander delivered with more points than anyone else in the league. Take, for example, this dagger 3 to defeat the Western Conference rival Denver Nuggets in March.

Gilgeous-Alexander shot 51.5% from the field in the clutch and connected on 13 of his 37 3-point attempts (35.1%). He also finished ninth in the NBA with 21 clutch assists and was tied at 34th with four steals in the clutch.

Murray finished second in the league with 166 clutch points on 52.2% shooting in 177.4 clutch minutes. Edwards played considerably fewer clutch minutes (93.8) than either and finished sixth in the league with 135 clutch points on 56.5% shooting from the field, the best rate of any of the top 15 clutch scorers.

Gilgeous-Alexander is the subject of frequent criticism for his propensity to draw fouls and score at the free-throw line. But his game is much more than that, and he’s delivered repeatedly for a Thunder team seeking its second straight NBA championship.