Just a little over two weeks ago, the Thunder put a 21 point loss on the Jazz, and at that time it was the first win of the season over a winning team. Tonight, the Jazz got a payback, slapping us with a 20 point loss. Box Score.
The Jazz were very efficient tonight offensively, scoring 110 points and ringing up 32 assists on 86 made field goals. They shot 51% from the field, 41% from deep and had an effective field goal rate of 55%. On the other side of the ball the Jazz had 12 steals, forced 25 turnovers and limited our field goal shooting to 48 % overall and 18% from deep (2/11).
I think we all knew that we would suffer defensively with the loss of Desmond Mason, and tonight our fears were realized. Read more…
Recap
If you are going to compare some stats from games with others, it’s always good to start with a win. Over the last 12 games, the Thunder have been surprisingly competitive. If you haven’t been watching, and only been looking at the league standings and won/loss records, you would naturally think “doormat” when labeling the Thunder. However starting with that win over Golden State on New Year’s Eve, OKC’s numbers might surprise you.
Let’s start with Offensive Rating (points scored per 100 possessions):
- Full season Thunder Offensive Rating: 102.1
- First 20 games under Coach Brooks: 105.3
- Last 12 games: 108.75
- League average: 107.4
Most excellent. The offensive efficiency season totals are well below average, but you can see improvement. I have some thoughts on why the offense has improved, but I will address those a bit later. Next lets look at Defensive Rating. Read more…
Commentary
Trying to wrap my arms around last night’s loss keeps me staring at the box score several hours later. I had been thinking about writing about the distribution of shots with the way the team is currently constructed, and after last night, the time seems to be right.
Kevin Durant dominated the play of the Thunder last night to a degree we haven’t yet seen. His statistical contribution to the team was monumental: 46 points, 15 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 steals and a block. Those are definitely eye popping numbers to be sure. But after digesting that, the next thing that pops out is the incredible amount of usage KD had. He attempted 23 field goals and 26 free throws, and gave the ball to others in the form of an assist 4 more times. The computation for individual possessions is long and complicated and I don’t want to get into it, but it’s fair to say he had the ball in his hands a whole lot last night.
To be sure, Kevin Durant will be an all star, and he is the unquestioned scoring leader on this team. It’s not too much of a stretch to think that KD could one day lead the league in scoring if that were his goal and the coach gave him that much latitude. But what I am interested in focusing on here is whether or not letting your star dominate the ball so much is a good thing for the TEAM’S success. Will the Thunder as a team be better off if KD begins to so thoroughly dominate the offense on a regular basis? Read more…
Commentary
Box Score Game Flow.
The Thunder lost a very winnable game tonight to an injury riddled team which barely had enough healthy bodies to field a team. It’s a shame the Thunder couldn’t muster up a little perimeter defense and hang onto the ball a little better and this thing could have been a completely different story.
The boys in Blue were killed by deep jumpers. Countless times the Clippers ran the drive and kick right down our throats. Playing without a real point guard for three quarters didn’t even seem to bother them a bit. They ran Fred Jones at the point, Ricky Davis, a banged up Jason Hart a few minutes and Eric Gordon handled the rock quite a bit. What’s really sad is that Ricky Davis is one of the most shot happy players in the NBA. He doesn’t like to give up the rock at all; but tonight, playing good minutes at the point he dished for 11 assists against our poor defense.
Eric Gordon showed why he was a lottery pick, one that I actually thought might go to us in the draft ( I never really thought Presti would reach for Westbrook at #4 when we already had Watson and Ridnour). He was just incredible offensively. He has the total package and is likely going to be rookie of the month for January. Westbrook, Watson and Mason all got schooled by EG. Al Thornton also played the best game I’ve ever seen him play. Green and Durant both shared duties on him and neither did much to slow him down. Read more…
Recap
I don’t want to detract from tonight’s game and pregame write up, so I will make this brief. There was a little news blurb out of Tulsa today, specifically our 66ers D-League Affiliate. Apparently Presti’s people down there (we are one of only three teams that actually own our own affiliate) re-acquired the shaggy one Steven Hill who had a little cup of coffee with the big team earlier this year. They traded former Thunder player Ronald Dupree who was in Tulsa.
But in other news, Presti’s guys acquired Gary Forbes in a trade for Chris Ellis. I’ve never heard of Chris Ellis, but I have heard of Gary Forbes. He was doing his best last spring trying to get drafted out of UMass. He had a good showing at the Portsmouth invitational, and was the MVP of the Orlando pre-draft camp (which is the camp that all the guys that aren’t a lock to get drafted go to). He is a scorer, not so much of a defender, and he is a shooting guard/swingman. He’s about the same size as D-Wilk.
The only real significance here is that we need a shooter, and he has been shooting well in the D-League. He was traded for, and so it gains significance with the trade deadline less than a month away. If we consolidate our roster, moving out one or more guys, this may be somebody that fills a role on the team if we are short handed. Same goes for Shaggy Hill.
The press release is here.
Gary Forbes’ Draftexpress bio.
Other
Box Score
What else can I say about this game that is more to the point than “too much Dwayne Wade”?
Forty eight minutes of deep shooting brilliance by the Heat, offset by mini runs and mini slumps by the Thunder. This game never really seemed like a game that the Thunder were going to win. It was close for most of the first quarter until the Heat took the lead at 22-19 late in the first, and never relinquished the lead.
The Thunder did many of the things that they’ve done successfully in the last 9 games, like getting to the line quite a bit, and win the battle of the boards, yet still the Thunder turned the ball over too much, and couldn’t seem to do anything about guarding the perimeter. The Heat just let fly from deep all night long, and the Thunder could only seem to counter that with average field goal shooting and a lot of free throws. The Heat launched 21 three pointers and hit 11 of them (52%). It’s tough to win countering that with one point free throws.
Tonight’s game was a bit unusual even for the the Heat. The Heat go to the line an average of 23 times per night. Against the Thunder, they didn’t bother with attacking the rim too often and only got to the line 14 times. Dwayne Wade averages 10 free throws alone, yet only got 2. He had twice as many three point attempts as he did free throw attempts. He also averages 21 field goal attempts, but tonight had 28. Why attack the basket? That’s a lot of work, and you get knocked around when you get there. It’s much easier to jack up shots if you can make them like Wade does. Read more…
Other
What wins basketball games?
I could ramble on and on, but smarter men than I have addressed this question, so why reinvent the wheel. Dean Oliver, author of “Basketball on Paper”, and a former consultant to the Sonics and current consultant with the Denver Nuggets has done all the statistical work and he breaks down what wins games to four factors, with their relative weights in parenthesis:
- Shoot a high field goal percentage (10).
- Do not commit turnovers (5-6).
- Get offensive rebounds (4-5).
- Get to the foul line frequently (2-3).
Teams that consistently win basketball games do at least three of these things well. If you don’t shoot well, you better do the other three. Oliver says these factors should be considered on the basis of the number of a team’s possessions compared to its opponent, not in absolute terms. Read more…
Other
