Inside The Numbers
By Randy Renner
In the regular season series the Thunder and the Clippers split the four games, each winning once at home and once on the road. And the games were competitive, entertaining and fairly close. In fact the combined points for the series added up to 432 for OKC and 428 for the Clippers or an average of 108-107 per game.
Center Kendrick Perkins played in both games the Thunder won but he was out injured in both games the Thunder lost.
Perk seemed to have a dramatic impact on the play of Clippers center DeAndre Jordan who was just 6-for-14 (14 points) in the two games he had to go up against Perkins. In the other two games, both Clippers victories, Jordan was guarded primarily by Steven Adams and Adams struggled to control the Clippers center. In those two games Jordan scored a combined 33 points on 12-for-14 shooting.
Perkins of course is fully healthy again and coming off a great series both on defense and on offense against the Memphis Grizzlies. Adams is also playing much better than he was back when he had to go up against Jordan.
Kevin Durant led the Thunder with 32.5 points per game on 44.1 percent shooting, he was just 7-for-24 (29.2 percent) on threes.
Russell Westbrook averaged 18.5 points against the Clippers on 39.7 percent shooting and he struggled from deep also, just 4-for-17 (23.5 percent)
Derek Fisher was the only Thunder player who lit the Clips up from beyond the arc, he was 5-for-10. Reggie Jackson had the next best percentage at 36.4 and the Thunder as a team shot 31.8 percent from deep but they hit 46.6 percent of their shots overall.
The Clippers were led by Blake Griffin who averaged 24.8 points in the four games against Oklahoma City but the real problem in the series was Jamal Crawford. He only played in three of the four games but when he was out there he made a difference. Crawford averaged 24.7 points against the Thunder (six points better than his 18.6 season average). He was especially deadly from beyond the arc where he connected on 45.5 percent of his shots (nine points better than his 36.1 season percentage).
Matt Barnes also hurt the Thunder from deep, splashing 43.8 percent of his 3-point tries and that was also about nine points better than his 34.3 season percentage.
J.J. Redick was not much of a factor, shooting just 29 percent overall and 22.2 percent on threes against the Thunder, well below his season percentages of 45.5 overall and 39.5 from deep.
Some other notes about the numbers…
Westbrook led the Thunder in rebounding against the Clippers in the regular season with 26 total for a per game average of 6.5. Steven Adams, who started two games in place of Kendrick Perkins, was second with 24/6.0 and nine of those 24 came off the offensive glass.
Caron Butler played in just one of the games, he was 2-for-5 (0-for-1 from three) and scored four points.
In the Clippers first round series with Golden State, DeAndre Jordan never took a shot from more than 10 feet out. 75.7 percent of his shots were at the rim and he hit 75 percent of those. The other 24.3 percent of his shots came from 3-10 feet and he hit 77.8 percent of those.