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Editor’s Note: Read more NBA coverage from The Athletic here. The views on this page do not necessarily reflect the views of the NBA or its teams. *** How dazzling are the Oklahoma City Thunder’s 2024-25 NBA championship rings? Each ring features more than 800 custom-cut, hand-set gemstones. For perspective: That’s approximately as many as the total number of 3-pointers the Thunder attempted during their playoff run last spring. Thunder players, Thunder chairman Clay Bennett, Thunder executive vice president and general manager Sam Presti and coach Mark Daigneault received their rings Tuesday night during an on-court, nationally televised ceremony in Oklahoma City before the first game of the 2025-26 NBA regular season, a matchup against the Houston Rockets. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver attended the ceremony. As individual players were introduced over Paycom Center’s public-address system, each player walked onto the court, where he clasped hands and hugged Silver, hugged Presti and hugged Bennett. It was Bennett who handed the boxes containing the rings to the players. Many of the players put the rings on their fingers. Reigning NBA MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the final player to receive his ring, put his ring on his right index finger. One hundred diamonds set in 14-karat gold adorn the top of the ring, along with the words “NBA CHAMPIONS” and the Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy. The rings — manufactured by The Champions Collective, a new business entity within Jostens, a company perhaps best known for its high school and college class rings — have a “ring-within-the-ring” design. The ring top opens, revealing what the ringmakers called a “bespoke inner band” with an engraving of the player’s signature and diamonds forming the player’s jersey number, according to The Champions Collective. Ninety-four diamonds sit along the top and bottom edges of the inner band, with every teammate’s jersey number wrapping around the band. The players can wear the inner ring as a substitute for their championship ring. Additional unique touches include: The team’s OKC mark and shield atop the ring’s face, with the shield filled with diamonds. In The Champions Collective’s words, the diamonds are “set together to represent the bond of the team.” The words “Oklahoma City” are on the left side of the ring, set apart by contrasting 14-karat white gold. “68-14,” the team’s regular-season record, between blue and orange sapphires. (Blue and orange are the team colors.) The ring’s outer-palm side features a tribute to the Oklahoma City National Memorial’s Gates of Time and Reflecting Pool. In 14-karat white gold, the gates’ shape is engraved between a pair of round sapphires, meant to evoke the water that shimmers between them. The interior palm side of the ring includes the Latin words “labor omnia vincit,” Oklahoma’s state motto, which translates to “work conquers all things.”
