Miami Heat 97 — OKC Thunder 95
For the second straight game, OKC’s Thunder found a way to lose on the road in the fourth period with Kevin Durant playing, and for the second straight game OKC showed a basic lack or the inability to make a play when it needed to.
Dwayne Wade hit two free throws with 1.5 seconds left to seal this defeat. Not that I’m all that strong on Dwayne Wade in the present tense, but I’ll go ahead and make him my OKCThunderGround No. 1 Star of the game with 28 points and a -3 on the stat sheet.
Sucks when a rogue blogger with his own Thunder blog has to admit this only three paragraphs into a recap in Game 19, but here goes–maybe the Thunder just aren’t all that good. There –I said it.
Maybe Scott Brooks wasn’t to blame. Maybe the guys around Durant and Westbrook aren’t adequate to be a serious contender. Maybe Billy Donovan is in over his head. Maybe Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook don’t understand what it takes defensively to win a championship. Maybe Sam Presti has too many one way players who can’t function on both ends of the court. Maybe?
One thing immediately jumps out to me–Durant and Westbrook scored 50 of the Thunder’s 95 points. Which means the rest of the team scored 45 points. Subtract Dion Waiter’s points and you’ve got the rest of the Thunder scoring 32 points on 12-31 shots … I think.
Anthony Morrow, DJ Augustin, and Andre Roberson combined for two points.
Serge Ibaka didn’t do anything which would make you think he could be the third best player of the Orlando Magic, let alone the third best player on the team Charles Barkley picked to win the NBA championship this season.
Fifteen assists for the Thunder.
Fifteen turnovers by the Thunder. Seven by Westbrook alone.
I honestly don’t know what to write about these guys tonight other than what I just wrote.
Thunder drop to 11-8 on the season and 2-4 on the road.
I better stop here because I’m not generally into meltdowns after a loss.
Mike Jackson