Inside The Thunder

OKC Thunder Swingman Steals Show at Championship Parade

The Oklahoma City Thunder are NBA champions. On Tuesday, the team held a parade and Aaron Wiggins stole the show.
Jun 24, 2025; Oklahoma City, OK, USA; Oklahoma City Thunder guard Aaron Wiggins (21) speaks to fans during the Champions Opening Ceremony for the parade inside the Paycom Center. Mandatory Credit: Alonzo Adams-Imagn Images
Jun 24, 2025; Oklahoma City, OK, USA; Oklahoma City Thunder guard Aaron Wiggins (21) speaks to fans during the Champions Opening Ceremony for the parade inside the Paycom Center. Mandatory Credit: Alonzo Adams-Imagn Images | Alonzo Adams-Imagn Images

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The Oklahoma City Thunder are NBA Champions. The Bricktown Ballers captured their first title by defeating the Indiana Pacers, 103-91, on Sunday in Game 7 of the 2025 NBA Finals.

On Tuesday, the Thunder held its 2025 NBA Championship parade, the first pro-sports parade in this City.

Oklahomans showed up in droves, an event that started in the Paycom Center for season ticket holders before the players loaded up on the baby blue buses with championship script lining the sides of them.

At the arena, Sideline report and Thunder content extraordinaire Paris Lawson emceed the event. The first name called upon? Aaron Wiggins.

The typically soft-spoken swingman, who has been mainly buttoned up in public settings with the media, let loose.

Wiggins gave an electric speech that shook the ground of the Paycom Center and was punctuated by a well-deserved mic drop.

"O-K-C, O-K-C," Wiggins begin, causing the crowd to break out into its typical cheer. "What a journey, what a journey, what is worth it?" he asked the crowd.

"I came in as the 55th pick in the 2021 draft. My rookie season, we won 24 games. 24 games...They tried to call us the black hole of the NBA. But four years later, when they mention the Thunder organization, when they mention Clay Bennet, when they mention Sam Presti, when they mention Mark Daigneault and every single one of you in this arena, they better mention you as NBA Champs!," Wiggins said emphatically before slamming the mic to the stage.

Wiggins was referring to Justin Termine, a Sirius XM radio host who infamously called Oklahoma City the "black eye" of the league, hoping the Thunder would rebuild the right way, like the Charlotte Hornets (Seriously, that was the example he used).

Now the Thunder are champions and before they even toured the streets of Bricktown, the team had a legendary moment that will live on in Oklahoma City history.


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Rylan Stiles
RYLAN STILES

Rylan Stiles is a credentialed media member covering the Oklahoma City Thunder. He hosts the Locked On Thunder Podcast, and is Lead Beat Writer for Inside the Thunder. Rylan is also an award-winning play-by-play broadcaster for the Oklahoma Sports Network. 

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