Month: March 2017

It’s a great day in Oklahoma. Fabulous weather, our basketball team is peaking at just the right time, and the fishing pretty is good as well. I worked so hard on that recap I thought I’d play one of my favorite music song scenes of all-time to get rid of the bad feeling of that very mediocre movie Moonlight winning Best Picture. This should get me out of that mood. For some reason, that’s really bothering me still.

With each passing game, Russell Westbrook’s impact on not only the Thunder, but to the state of Oklahoma as a whole is growing to mythical proportions. Tuesday night inside the Chesapeake Energy Arena was just another night in the process for Westbrook as he once again put his team on his back and just basically said, “We’re not losing this game.”

The Oklahoma City Thunder beat the Utah Jazz 109-106 in a wonderful playoff-like game which makes one hope maybe these two teams could do battle in a first round No. 4 vs. No. 5 matchup. It was a great game between two teams on the rise who should only get better heading down the stretch.

Westbrook was Westbrook as he notched his 30th triple double of the season and now is only one behind Wilt and eleven behind Oscar with 22 games remaining. It was vintage Westbrook as with each passing game what we see is a mixture of Michael and Kobe emerging as Westbrook no longer has to make sure Kevin Durant and his handlers are happy with ball distribution issues.

Triple Double # 30 reads…43 points, 11 rebounds, and 11 assists. But what makes this even more impressive is once again Westbrook revved up his game in the final four minutes of the game and made the shots his team had to have as he scored 14 of the Thunder’s last 15 points.

At one point, OKC led by as many as 13 points, but Utah is a good basketball team and did not go away. More to the point, they battled back and led by four heading down the stretch until Westbrook said enough and took matters into his own hands. As a kid in LA, Westbrook grew up watching Kobe. With the departure of Durant to the Warriors, in essence — Westbrook has now become Kobe and amidst all the angst Durant’s weak departure created in Oklahoma City, there is no longer sadness in looking back to what might have been. Because if Durant had stayed, we would never have fully seen Westbrook turn into his own Kobe butterfly.

But it isn’t just Westbrook which gives this city hope heading into March. It’s the fact piece by piece Sam Presti has crafted a basketball team to fit Russell Westbrook’s skill set, not Kevin Durant’s. First it was the trade which brought Oladipo, Sabonis, and Ilyasova to the Thunder. Then it was the trade which sent Ilyasova to Philadelphia for do everything player Jerami Grant. Last Thursday on the trading deadline, Presti sent Anthony Morrow, Joff Lauvergne, and Cam Payne to the Chicago Bulls for tough guy Taj Gibson and scoring savant Doug McDermott. And, if you haven’t been paying attention Sam Presti made one last move in acquiring veteran Norris Cole to man the backup point guard position early this week. It’s been amazing to watch, but piece by piece, Sam Presti has kept his word to Russell Westbrook and put a good basketball team around him.

Two things were evident on Tuesday night, Taj Gibson has supplanted rookie Domas Sabonis as the team’s go to power forward moving forward. Not a knock on Sabonis, but this isn’t a time for a rookie, it’s a time this team needs a hardened vet on the floor with Westbrook for as many minutes as possible. Same with McDermott as on Tuesday night he showed his immediate worth by scoring 16 points and giving the Thunder a 4-4 night from behind the arc on a night when the Thunder as a team went 15-22 shooting threes.

But here’s what’s truly amazing about this game–Victor Oladipo missed his third straight game due to back spasms and fellow starters Steven Adams, Andre Roberson, and Sabonis scored a combined 7 points in this basketball game. Translated–this means four of OKC’s starters scored a combined 7 points and yet Oklahoma City won perhaps their biggest game of the season to date.

Enes Kanter, Alex Abrines, and Jerami Grant were all excellent on Tuesday night as OKC’s bench along with McDermott and Gibson scored 48 points as a unit.

I haven’t mentioned Kevin Durant’s knee injury and I won’t until the final word comes out today regarding his MRI. But know this, if that MRI comes out the wrong way for the Super Team from Oakland all the sudden the Western Conference becomes very interesting heading into March.