About Oklahoma City Thunder
The Oklahoma City Thunder are an American professional basketball team based in Oklahoma City. The Thunder compete in the National Basketball Association as a member of the Northwest Division of the Western Conference. The team plays its home games at Paycom Center.
The Thunder's NBA G League affiliate is the Oklahoma City Blue, which it owns. The Thunder are the only team in the major professional North American sports leagues based in the state of Oklahoma. Oklahoma City previously hosted the New Orleans Hornets for two seasons following devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.
The team was originally established as the Seattle SuperSonics, an expansion team that joined the NBA for the 1967–68 season. The SuperSonics relocated from Seattle to Oklahoma City on July 3, 2008, after a settlement was reached between the ownership group led by Clay Bennett and lawmakers in Seattle following a lawsuit. In Seattle, the SuperSonics qualified for the NBA playoffs 22 times, won their division six times, advanced to three NBA Finals, and won the 1979 NBA Championship.
In Oklahoma City, the Thunder qualified for their first playoff berth during the 2009–10 season. They won their first division title as the Thunder in the 2010–11 season and their first Western Conference championship as the Thunder in the 2011–12 season, appearing in the NBA Finals for the fourth time in franchise history and first time since 1996, when the team was based in Seattle.
The Thunder's previous incarnation, the Seattle SuperSonics were formed in 1967. In their 41 seasons in Seattle, the SuperSonics compiled a 1,745–1,585 win–loss record in the regular season and went 107–110 in the playoffs. The franchise's titles include three Western Conference championships and one NBA title in 1979.
In 2006, former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz sold the SuperSonics and its Women's National Basketball Association sister franchise, the Seattle Storm, for $350 million to the Professional Basketball Club LLC, a group of Oklahoma City investors led by Clay Bennett. The sale of the SuperSonics and Storm was approved by NBA owners the following October. In 2007, Bennett announced that the franchise would move to Oklahoma City as soon as the lease with KeyArena expired.
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