The Seattle SuperSonics (also commonly referred to as the Sonics) were an American professional basketball team based in Seattle, Washington that played in the Pacific and Northwest Divisions of the National Basketball Association (NBA) from 1967 until 2008. Following the 2007–08 season, the team relocated to Oklahoma City, and now plays as the Oklahoma City Thunder. The SuperSonics nickname, logo, and color scheme will be made available to any subsequent NBA team in Seattle. According to the team's Oklahoma-based owners, the Sonics' franchise history would be "shared" between the Thunder and any future Seattle club.

The SuperSonics won the NBA Championship in 1979, and are one of just two teams out of the six major-league men's professional sports franchises that have existed in Seattle (the Sonics, Mariners, Pilots, Seahawks, Sounders, and Metropolitans, winners of the 1917 Stanley Cup) to have won a championship.

Sam Schulman owned the team from its 1967 inception until 1983. It was also owned by Barry Ackerley (1983–2001), and the Basketball Club of Seattle, headed by Starbucks chairman Howard Schultz (2001–2006). On Halloween, October 31, 2006, the SuperSonic purchase by Oklahoma City businessman Clay Bennett was finalized and the new ownership group took control. After failing to find public funding to construct a new arena in the Seattle area, the SuperSonics moved to Oklahoma City before the 2008–09 season, following a $45 million settlement with the city of Seattle to pay off the team's existing lease at KeyArena in advance of its 2010 expiration.

Seattle (pronounced /siːˈætɫ̩/ ( listen) see-AT-əl or /siːˈæɾɫ̩/) is the county seat of King County, in the U.S. state of Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country. The city is a major coastal seaport situated on a narrow isthmus between Puget Sound (an arm of the Pacific Ocean) and Lake Washington, about 114 miles (183 km) south of the Canada–United States border. In 2010, Seattle was the sixth busiest port in the United States, serving as a major gateway for trade with Asia.

The Seattle area had been inhabited by Native Americans for at least 4,000 years before the first permanent white settlers.Arthur A. Denny and his group of travelers, subsequently known as the Denny Party, arrived at Alki Point on November 13, 1851. The settlement was moved to its current site and renamed "Seattle" in 1853, after Chief Seattle of the local Duwamish and Suquamish tribes.

Jeffrey William "Jeff" Van Gundy (born January 19, 1962) is a former American basketball head coach. He has coached two teams in the National Basketball Association: the New York Knicks and the Houston Rockets. Van Gundy attended Yale University before transferring to Menlo College and ultimately graduated from New York's Nazareth College in 1985.

His older brother Stan Van Gundy has served as head coach of the NBA's Miami Heat and Orlando Magic.

Van Gundy was born in Hemet, California. He grew up in the town of Brockport N.Y. He was the son of a basketball coach, Bill Van Gundy, the former head coach at Brockport State University in Western New York. As a high-school point guard, he was a two-time All Greater Rochester selection in 1979 and 1980, leading Brockport Central to the Class AA finals. He continued his career at Nazareth College where he earned All American honors while leading the Golden Flyers to an NCAA Tournament berth in 1984. He remains the Nazareth career leader in free throw percentage at 87%.

Gary Dwayne Payton (born July 23, 1968) is a former American professional basketball point guard. He is best known for his 13-year tenure with the Seattle SuperSonics, and holds Seattle franchise records in points, assists, and steals. He has also played with the Milwaukee Bucks, Los Angeles Lakers, Boston Celtics and Miami Heat, the last with whom he won an NBA Championship.

The only point guard ever to win the NBA Defensive Player of the Year award, Payton is widely considered one of the greatest of all time at that position. He was selected to the NBA All-Defensive First Team nine times, an NBA record he shares with Michael Jordan, Kevin Garnett and Kobe Bryant. Payton got his nickname "The Glove" when Payton's cousin called him during the 1993 Western Conference Finals series against Phoenix and told him, "you're holding Kevin Johnson like a baseball in a glove," and the nickname was born.

Considered the "NBA's reigning high scorer among point guards" in his prime, Payton is referred to as "probably as complete a guard as there ever was" by NBA Hall of Famer Gail Goodrich.

Shawn T. Kemp (born November 26, 1969) is a former American professional basketball player, who played in the National Basketball Association for 14 seasons. He was a six-time NBA All-Star and a three-time All-NBA Second Team member.

Kemp attended Concord High School in Elkhart, Indiana. He was considered to be one of the top four or five players nationally his senior year, and led his team to the state championship finals. Kemp finished third for the state's coveted Mr. Basketball award (behind Woody Austin and Chandler Thompson). During his senior year, Kemp signed a national letter-of-intent to play basketball at the University of Kentucky. However, he left the team in November 1988 after he was accused of pawning two gold chains that had been reported stolen from his teammate Sean Sutton, the son of then Kentucky head coach Eddie Sutton. Sean Sutton did not press charges, but Kemp transferred to Trinity Valley Community College in Texas. After a semester at TVCC, where he did not play, 19-year-old Shawn Kemp declared himself eligible for the 1989 NBA Draft.