Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is AllSportsPeople 2025 Male Athlete of the Year

Three hours after Shai Gilgeous-Alexander had led the Thunder to a dramatic Game 7 Finals victory and their first championship, Canada's The Sports Network analyst and long-time friend Jevohn Shepherd approached the star to congratulate him on his achievement. Shepherd had expected SGA to be celebrating and living it up in the moment. But rather than jubilation, the superstar had a serious look on his face. 

"I can get so much better," Gilgeous-Alexander told Shepherd. "There's still so much room to get better." 

It was a bold statement to make for a player who had joined Michael Jordan, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and Shaquille O'Neal as the only players to win the regular season MVP, Finals MVP, and scoring title in the same season. That was in addition to being named an All-Star, All-NBA First Team selection, Western Conference Finals MVP, and an ESPY winner for Male Athlete of the Year. SGA can now add AllSportsPeople Male Athlete of the Year to the trophy case. How could anyone expect to top that kind of campaign?

MORE: A'ja Wilson is SN's 2025 Female Athlete of the Year

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander wins SN's Male Athlete of the Year

For Shepherd though, that was typical Shai. He'd known Gilgeous-Alexander since the two worked out together under renowned trainer Nathanial Mitchell. That was back when Shepherd was winding up his international playing career and Gilgeous-Alexander was a 17-year-old high school student on the rise. He'd seen the obsessive behavior firsthand, the insatiable desire to always improve, working through water breaks while he was supposed to be resting. He'd followed the rapid rise from the days when Shai was coming off Kentucky's bench to present-day.

"He picked everything up so seamlessly," Shepherd recalled of those first training sessions a decade earlier. "There were times where I would struggle with the concepts, but his IQ was so far advanced. He was a high schooler that was actually teaching me different moves."

That quick learning ability came from the time that Gilgeous-Alexander was a toddler growing up in Toronto. His father, Vaughan Alexander, knew that there was something special about his eldest son. At two and a half, Shai could pick up a pencil, hold it, and write and read. 

"He would write out cat, dog, other words. The doctor said that this kid is basically borderline-genius," Alexander said.

Shai was a quick pupil at everything, including his first love, soccer. He had the genes for sports too. His mother, Charmaine Gilgeous, was an Olympic track athlete for Antigua and Barbuda. Vaughan was a high school basketball star. 

Shai, his younger brother Thomasi, and his cousin Nickeil Alexander-Walker were an inseparable trio growing up. Nickeil and Shai were more like twins than cousins. Along with training them, Vaughan gave his boys a PhD in the NBA. He dressed them in Allen Iverson jerseys and brought them to the Raptors' second round series against the Sixers back in 2001 when Shai and Nickeil were two years old, much to the chagrin of the Toronto locals.

"Everybody’s like yo, what the h--, you couldn’t get them some Vince Carter jerseys?" Vaughan recalled, laughing. 

SN Athletes of the Year

ARCHIVE: Complete list of past winners since 1968

Vaughan encouraged the three kids to watch more of the league and play less video games. Shai grew up on Iverson, Kobe Bryant, Chris Paul, Paul Pierce, and other stars of the 2000's. 

"Whoever was a killer at that time, he took a piece of everybody's game and what made them dominant," Vaughan said. "That’s why it makes sense for his game to be old school. A lot of people say you can’t speed him up. That comes from that style of play, an old school style of player instead of these guys who are dunking and jumping and touching the moon."

That respect for the greats never went away. Gilgeous-Alexander isn't much of a partier. He doesn't hit up clubs. One of his closest friends, Vincent Chu, revealed what the star enjoys during his down time. 

"We sit there, we eat some food, and we watch highlights. That’s what we do. I can’t tell you how many times we’ve watched the same Steph Curry and Kobe Bryant highlights," Chu said.

There is more to those clips than pure entertainment value. Gilgeous-Alexander will oftentimes send them to his trainer and ask if he can incorporate the moves of the greats into his own repertoire. 

SGA models game after the greats

Mitchell and his star pupil have pulled from sources both obvious and surprising. They've looked at fadeaways from Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, face-up, no dribble scoring from Carmelo Anthony, dribble moves from Hakeem Olajuwon, Tracy McGrady's elevation on certain types of jump shots, and even Al Jefferson's low post baseline spin moves. 

Gilgeous-Alexander studies the techniques, then heads to his own personal lab over the summer, which are unusual in their nature. While other NBA players oftentimes train together, he works out with a select group consisting mostly of childhood friends. They call themselves the Sunrise Workout Club. 

"We work out before sunrise, and we finish by sunrise," explained Chu, who is going on Year Seven of participating in the workouts in Hamilton, SGA's hometown about 40 miles from Toronto.

The club consists of a few of Gilgeous-Alexander's childhood friends who take time from their normal lives to help train him for 60 to 75 minutes every morning during the offseason. Maurice Montoya and Mark Castillanes met Gilgeous-Alexander in sixth grade. Sunday Kong, Devante Campbell, and Chu crossed paths with him in high school. None of them are professional athletes, but they have taken on the role of helping the best one in the world hone his craft. 

MORE: Ranking the best athletes since the year 2000

Chu sat next to SGA during his first high school class and bonded over Shai's KD4 shoes, which he was bold enough to wear outside. 

"Because they're so expensive, I'm not ruining those putting them outside. I thought it was kind of cool," Chu said. 

"I spent crazy money on shoes," Vaughan recalled, laughing. "They used to f—ing kill me at Christmas time.”

Chu was tasked with guarding Gilgeous-Alexander between Years Two and Three of the club. 

"I had to learn how to play defense. I thought I could play D, but clearly not," Chu laughed. 

Gilgeous-Alexander honed his post game during those workouts, refusing to take it easy on his friends.

"Those first couple of summers when he was learning how to post up, I remember coming home and chest was just red," Chu said. He lost 20 pounds over two years before he was eventually replaced by a bigger defender. 

Part of that need came from Shai improving his own body. His strength coach, Nem Ilic, is a Hamilton native that converted his two-car garage into a gym. It's not uncommon for neighborhood kids to see Gilgeous-Alexander pushing a weighted sled down Ilic's street. 

Ilic was one of the last to join SGA's circle, which the star keeps tight. 

"He’s very secretive," Mitchell said. "You don’t see a lot of highlights online posted of his workouts."

The one exception where he will open up his group is with high school students. Once in a while, he will invite a local kid to join him. 

There are several reasons for the inclusion. He wants to pay it forward and pass along his wisdom to the next generation, as Shepherd and other vets did for him. But he also treats his practices as more than perfecting basketball moves. He wants to practice how to be a better leader and communicator too. 

"If he can do that with a high schooler in the gym, have him keep up and communicate with him, it allows him to be a better communicator with his teammates," Shepherd said. "Most guys don’t think like that."

That dedication to all-around improvement led Shai to be named SN's best male athlete of 2025, and he should be even better in 2026. His Thunder have a better winning percentage this season, he's improved his shooting from the field and from 3, and he's still scoring at the same elite clip.

SGA has gotten tangibly better, my goodness pic.twitter.com/FVT0xJ88UD

— buddhaball🏀 🍉🇺🇦☸️ (@SiddharthNBA) December 8, 2025

Shepherd isn't surprised. This is SGA's first foray into the awards circle. It won't be his last. 

"We're talking about someone that is aiming to be one of the best to ever do it," Shepherd said. "He’s focused on being one of the ones where when it’s all said and done, you speak about him differently." 

Gilgeous-Alexander has cemented himself as one of the best players of his generation. But his internal measuring stick is against the heroes that he watched over and over — Kobe Bryant, Stephen Curry, Michael Jordan, and the other great guards of NBA history. He's adding to his own YouTube highlights reel in pursuit of those legends. He'll have to wait until his retirement before he's satisfied enough to watch it.