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The tickets were supposedly tougher to get than the Super Bowl, and the game didn’t disappoint. The Oklahoma City Thunder gave the Golden State Warriors their toughest challenge of the season, but they fell short by a score of 116-108 on Saturday night.
Early on it looked like the Warriors were going to run away with the game, but the Thunder rallied from a 20-point deficit to tie the game with 3:35 left. They even had a real shot at winning the game. Russell Westbrook had a layup slide off the front of the rim down one with 3:09 to go. On the Thunder’s next possession, Kevin Durant had a good look at a go-ahead three, but it clanged off the rim. He had another one shortly after that would’ve tied it rattle in and out.
The Negatives
First-Half Defense
In the first half, the Warriors did to the Thunder exactly what they did to the San Antonio Spurs and the Cleveland Cavaliers before them. The defending NBA champions took the best shot from one of their main competitors and shook it off like nothing happened.
The Thunder jumped out to an early 9-0 lead before the Warriors whittled it down to nothing, and then raced out to a 20-point lead in the middle of the second quarter before eventually settling for a 13-point lead at half.
All was going well for the Thunder at first as Donovan started Durant on Draymond Green and Serge Ibaka on Harrison Barnes. It was a clever move because it meant the Thunder could switch the Warriors’ 1-4 pick-and-rolls with Stephen Curry and Green without any issue, making the Warriors run a lot less of it than they normally do.
The Warriors got their usual good shots, but the Thunder forced other Warriors besides Curry and Klay Thompson to take those shots. They had a plan for Curry and Thompson, and they executed it well. But Curry and Thompson will find the open man to take the best available shot.
The problem was Barnes was the open man and he made his shots, hitting 8-14 for 19 points (16 in the first half). He pulled Ibaka away from the paint and turned him into a perimeter defender, which isn’t a strength.
The Thunder got roasted for 73 points in the first half as their bench got cooked 23-4, which takes us to our next negative.
2. Bench Play
Overall, Oklahoma City’s bench was outscored 42-17 (14 coming from Enes Kanter). That’s rough.
Rookie point guard Cameron Payne looked like a rookie more than he ever has this season. He’ll have to learn, because the 10-15 minutes he will be expected to play come playoff time are going to be vital. Payne was getting killed by quicker, stronger and taller players like Leandro Barbosa and Shaun Livingston. Maybe Donovan has Andre Roberson come off the bench to guard either of those players, but I’ll get into that in a bit.
3. Changes in Starting Five?
This isn’t necessarily a negative. More just some possible lineup changes that might need to be made to have the best shot against the Warriors. The Thunder have all this money invested in one of the biggest front lines in the NBA, but they can’t play them against the Warriors. Kanter, Ibaka and Steven Adams all had their moments on Saturday, but they rarely happened when they were playing together.
So the best thing to do might be to play one at a time, which means starting Durant at the 4 and going with either Ibaka or Adams against Andrew Bogut. This way you can continue to start Dion Waiters at the 2 and substitute Andre Roberson for one of the bigs. Roberson is the best perimeter defender on the team, and he could guard Thompson and Waiters could guard Barnes. Either way you have a perimeter defender guarding Barnes instead of the rim-protecting Ibaka.
Then again, the Thunder did stay big against the Warriors’ smaller linueps, and it was pretty successful. If the Thunder are to play big, playing Ibaka and Kanter together is the best option. That way you have the pick-and-pop option with Westbrook and Ibaka, and you have the pick-and-roll option with Westbrook and Kanter.
They can still play big with a lot of offensive firepower and have the rim-protecting Ibaka to help Kanter on the backside. While Ibaka didn’t have a big game statistically with eight points and three rebounds, he can still be an important factor in defending the rim against the Warriors.
With Roberson returning from a knee injury some time this month, Donovan will have to decide if he wants to go back to Roberson or stick with Waiters in the starting lineup. Waiters did a decent job defensively, but Thompson can have his way with him because of his size advantage. Roberson is a better match for Thompson, but starting Waiters forced the Warriors to have Curry guard Westbrook at times and then switch on Waiters.
Waiters can still hold his own on the defensive end, but the question is whether he can be consistent enough on the other end. Saturday night he didn’t do much offensively (five points on 1-of-5 shooting), but the Warriors know he at least has to be guarded, which opens up more for Durant and Westbrook. Starting Roberson would likely lead to the Warriors giving him the Tony Allen treatment.
Another question is: Do the Thunder still need to make a trade? It’s clear that they need a 2-guard with the combination of Roberson and Waiters, but those type of players aren’t exactly available, so they may just have to roll with what they have.
The Positives
1. Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook
Durant continued his dominance against the Warriors at Oracle Arena by scoring 40 points and pulling down 14 rebounds, while Westbrook added 27 points and 12 assists. Donovan just needs to find a way to stagger both of them so that one of them is on the floor at all times. Surprise, surprise, the Thunder are better when at least one of them is on the floor.
2. Enes Kanter
So, Kanter seems to be playable against the Warriors. In fact, he was a big reason the Thunder were still in the game late in the fourth quarter. It was only one game, but Kanter could be an X-factor in the series.
Yes, when he got isolated in pick-and-roll situations, he got burned and the Warriors often scored. But Billy Donovan stuck with him and had him guard non-screeners like Andre Iguodala and Livingston, which made it less likely to be put in those pick-and-roll situations.
Kanter showed what he could do as a destroyer of small-ball lineups, beasting the Warriors on the offensive glass and giving Westbrook a lethal pick-and-roll option. Kanter produced 14 points and 15 rebounds in just 20 minutes.
3. Second-Half Defense and the Comeback
The Thunder did a terrific job limiting Curry and Thompson’s looks from beyond the arc, and in the second half did well on the defensive end as a whole by holding the Warriors to 43 points.
Curry hit just 10 of his 25 shots overall, including 1-of-8 from three. Thompson hit 1-of-6 from three, and the Warriors as a team hit 7-of-26 from deep for the game.
Sure, Curry and Thompson missed some they usually make, but that shouldn’t negate the Thunder’s defense, which did a nice job of using length to contest and make them rush shots. Next time, they might make all of their shots and combine for 70 because that’s how they’ve been all year, but that didn’t happen in this one.
Getting stops allowed Oklahoma City to get back into the game, and it had them in position to end several crazy Golden State streaks. Unfortunately, the offense familiarly bogged down late in the game as Durant and Westbrook went iso down the stretch. While this can often be an effective strategy given the otherworldly talents of those two, it would’ve been nice to see a bit more ball movement against the Warriors.
Final Thoughts
In terms of whether the Thunder are a contender, they looked the part. They trailed by 20 thanks largely to a bench implosion, but the most impressive thing was how they came back with better execution on both sides of the ball.
The Thunder did what the Spurs and Cavaliers couldn’t do before them; they hung with Golden State. The Warriors are on pace to become one of the best teams of all times, but the Thunder shouldn’t fear them, so don’t crown anybody just yet.