OKC Thunder 122 — Denver Nuggets 112
With the state of Oklahoma in the grips of Winter Storm Goliath, OKC’s Thunder shook off another lethargic start to finally subdue the short-handed, out-talented, yet resilient Nuggets by a score of 122-112.
No Wilson Chandler. No Danilo Gallinari. No Emmanuel Mudiay. Yet, Denver played tough and actually led 61-53 at the half as they shot close to sixty-percent in the first half.
OKC’s defense wasn’t good, but give some credit to Denver’s lineups with Kenneth Faried, Gary Harris, Will Barton, Jameer Nelson, and Randy Foye which in essence took Steven Adams out of being a factor for the second straight game.
Faried was outstanding with a 25 point, 11 rebound night plus some great energy on the offensive glass in the first half. Will Barton and Joffrey Lauvergne added 19 and 18 points respectively.
OKC in no way addressed any of their defensive issues, but did show enough interest against a limited Nuggets team playing on the second night of a road back to back to get a win.
Denver led as late as the 8:13 mark in fourth period before OKC finally took control of the game with an 11-2 run which was fueled by Enes Kanter’s seven points and a resounding dunk by Dion Waiters.
Offensively–it was OKC’s best shooting night of the season as the Thunder shot 57.8 % from the field and 53.3 % from behind the arc.
Five Thunder players scored in double figures. Westbrook with 30, Durant with 26, Kanter with 21, Ibaka with 19, and Roberson with 10 points.
Steven Adams for the most part didn’t fit in this game because of the odd lineup combinations used by Mike Malone. Andre Roberson was decent with 10 points, 5 rebounds and 2 steals in 27 minutes.
Russell Westbrook is my No. 1 Star of the Game with 30 points, 9 rebounds, and 12 assists.
As a team–OKC had 27 assists with 22 of them being credited to Westbrook and Durant. Ball movement wasn’t an issue in this game. The ball moved fairly well.
I thought Donovan did a god job of utilizing Waiters, rookie Cameron Payne, and Anthony Morrow. Each added something off the bench which helped OKC get the win.
Not sure if this is where Billy Donovan is going with the backup point guard minutes or if he just felt it was time to take a more serious look at Cam Payne. Either way, I thought Payne played well, but again it was at home against a bottom feeding team in the West who were without three of their more skilled players.
But still– a nice step forward for Cam Payne. I’d keep feeding him minutes at home against lesser teams and nurture his confidence. See what happens because unless these guys start playing defense they’re not winning anything anyway.
OKC improves to 21-9 and is in solid possession of the No. 3 seed in the West. Denver drops to 12-19 and hopefully drops to the No. 13 slot in the West per my bracket.
Milwaukee in Oklahoma City Tuesday, epic Winter Storm Goliath headed northeast. Billy Donovan still searching for some defensive consistency from his star studded team.
Mike Jackson