Oklahoma City – Coming off of a 47 point loss to the Bucks, the Thunder hosted the Clippers tonight and for the first time this season, they got to see what a fully healthy Clippers team looks like. It was a good test to see how they would fare against a team that could come out of the west and a team they could possibly see in the playoffs.
The Thunder had 3 days off after they were handed the worst loss in franchise history on Friday so many hoped they would come into the game with a lot of energy. That is not what happened.
They gave up 38 and allowed the Clippers to shoot 63.6% from the field and 45.5% from 3 after the 1st quarter. It didn’t get much better after that.
Every time the Thunder would get stops and go on any kind of run to decrease the lead to single digits, the Clippers responded with a run of their own and increase their lead back to 15+. Clippers led by as much as 21 and it was simply too much for the Thunder to overcome.
The Thunder were led by Dennis Schroeder who had 24 points off the bench and was pretty much the only offense the Thunder had the whole night. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Danilo Gallinari both added 15 points while Chris Paul had 14 points and 7 assists. The offense simply wasn’t there for the Thunder.
You would think a game where the Clippers scored 38 in the first, shot as well as they did in the first, led by as much as 21 and won by 15, the Clippers would have scored at least 120. However, that was not the case. Outside of that first quarter the Thunder defense wasn’t bad at all. Clippers ended the game shooting 45.2% from the field and 30.6% from 3 and only scored 109. Thunder just couldn’t find a way to consistently score against their defense.
This was a good test for the Thunder. Not because it’s a team they could see in the playoffs but because it showed them that they can not continue to play the way they have been playing. It’s March and they have now played 61 games. At this point, teams are more than likely playing the way they will play for the rest of the year. That’s a problem for the Thunder.
Too many times they get down by 10-15+ to mediocre teams but they have a lot of fight in them so they can come back. That won’t be able to happen against the teams they will see in the playoffs. Good teams don’t let you come back 4 times in a series. It will be similar to what happened against the Clippers which is a good team getting up by 10-15+, the Thunder getting that lead down to single digits, sometimes as close as 1-3, and then the other team eventually pulling away to win. Sometimes it the game will end with the Thunder only losing by 5 or less but that doesn’t matter because they still lost.
It’s good that they are being shown they can’t play like this because the good teams simply won’t allow it. Now, only time will tell how they respond. They can continue to play like this and they will have their 4th straight 1st round exit or they can come into every game like it’s their last and play a full 48 minute consistent game.
The Thunder will have a quick turnaround and look to recover from back to back blowouts with a road game against the Pistons on the 2nd night of a back to back.
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