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Gilgeous-Alexander becomes 14th player to win back-to-back NBA MVPs

He’s the best player on the best team. And the voters say he’s the best player in the league, too.

Again.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander of the reigning NBA champion Oklahoma City Thunder won the NBA’s Most Valuable Player on Sunday for the second consecutive year. He became the 18th player to win at least two MVP awards and the 14th to win them in back-to-back fashion.

“Basketball’s obviously a team sport,” Gilgeous-Alexander said Sunday night in a celebration at the Thunder practice facility, surrounded by teammates — all in new Burberry trenchcoats, a gift from the now two-time MVP. “All the numbers, all the accolades, everything that I do on the court, if we won 10 games I wouldn’t be in this conversation. So, thank you guys so much. I love you guys.”

The win for Gilgeous-Alexander, who is Canadian, marks the eighth consecutive time that the NBA’s MVP was born outside the U.S. The run started with Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo (born in Greece, of Nigerian descent) in 2019 and 2020, then Denver’s Nikola Jokic (Serbia) in 2021 and 2022, Philadelphia’s Joel Embiid (born in Cameroon but has since become a U.S. citizen) in 2023 and Jokic again in 2024.

And in 2025 and 2026, SGA is the MVP.

Jokic was second and San Antonio’s star French center Victor Wembanyama placed third.

Gilgeous-Alexander got 83 of a possible 100 first-place votes. Jokic received 10 and Wembanyama got five. Luka Doncic of the Los Angeles Lakers was fourth in the voting and Cade Cunningham of the Detroit Pistons was fifth.

Cunningham got two first-place votes — the first by a U.S.-born player since 2021.

International players went 1-2-3 in the voting for the fifth straight season.

Jaylen Brown of the Boston Celtics was sixth, and Kawhi Leonard of the Los Angeles Clippers and Donovan Mitchell of the Cleveland Cavaliers tied for seventh with one fifth-place vote apiece.

(AP Photo Ross D. Franklin)
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