Suspect Rotations May Have Cost OKC The Game
By A. Suave Francisco
Tuesday night presented another obstacle to cap off this grueling January schedule for the Oklahoma City Thunder. Travelling to San Antonio to face the Spurs, everyone knew it'd be a very challenging game and maybe even a long shot when thinking about a Thunder win, especially without Enes Kanter. Despite an impressive comeback, the Thunder couldn't find the consistency to beat the Spurs, dropping their 21st game of the season 108-94.
It's hard to blame a coach for a loss, but the Thunder would've had a great chance to win if Billy Donovan would've tweaked his rotation differently according to the flow of this game.
In the third quarter, the Thunder went on a 20-2 run, turning a 17-point deficit to a 3-point lead halfway through the third quarter. Russell Westbrook exploded for 14 points in the quarter and had his team rolling at a consistent pace for the first time in the game. Subsequently, Donovan pulled Russell and Steven Adams, inserted the second team and things got disjointed offensively and defensively.
In addition to that, Westbrook and Adams were a combined +16 when they were in the game. The combination of Cameron Payne and Joffrey Lauvergne was -47. Speaking of Payne, his confidence on the offensive end is lacking right now, on the same level as Andre Roberson. Sticking to the rotation can be great, but can also be detrimental depending on the situation. Donovan should've seen the momentum his team built in that third quarter and ran with it. An extra 10 minutes for a 28-year old with a never-ceasing engine against the Spurs won't make or break anything for him moving forward, whether this was the first game of a back-to-back or not. Taking him out of the game at that time is the ultimate reason OKC lost the game.
All that being said, that wasn't the only problem. The Thunder played horribly in the first quarter of this game, only scoring 17 points and committing a ton of turnovers. For the game, they shot 35.3 percent from the field and 25.0 percent from three-point range while committing 20 turnovers. That definitely didn't help their case for winning the game tonight, but despite the horrible percentages, the Thunder had the lead and momentum until the second team entered the game to finish out the third quarter.
Billy Donovan voiced how "unfair" it would've been to play Russell 40-plus minutes tonight, but in this situation, after a rough month of basketball full of inconsistency, a tone could've been set with a win over the second-best team in the NBA. This win could've possibly given a young and learning team that confidence and motivation going into the rest of the season. However, since that didn't happen, the Thunder fall to (28-21) on the season and drop to seventh in the Western Conference, just a half-game behind the Memphis Grizzlies for sixth.