Thunder 88 - Timberwolves 85. Ahh...that's better. The Thunder secured their first victory, fighting back and then holding on to give the home crowd much needed satisfaction. The Timberwolves were seemingly in control for the first three quarters, allowing the Thunder to take the lead only once, before being held to just 12 points in the final quarter.
Kevin Durant led the way with 18 points, as 5 Thunder players (Thunderites?) scored in double figures. Russell Westbrook set a career high with 14 points, and numerous big plays in the second half. With the team in a close game for the first time, PJ unleashed his crunch time lineup for the final four minutes: Durant, Westbrook, Jeff Green, Earl Watson and Nick Collison. Aside from Watson, there was little to argue with, though Green continued to show he's not ready for prime time by missing two huge free throws with 7 seconds left. With renewed life, the Timberwolves had a chance to send the game to overtime leading to Ryan Gomes missed 3-pointer at the buzzer.
Westbrook continues to add a different dimension to the Thunder offense. While he remains a poor distributor, he is the only 'slasher' on the team, and the offense can easily become stagnant if they aren't hitting their shots when he isn't on the floor. Carlesimo threw a new look tonight, allowing Westbrook and Watson to play together, which also shifts Durant and Green to their more natural positions of small forward and power forward respectively (though Green is a tweener in the truest sense of the word).
Westbrook has already managed to do in three games, what Green still has failed to do: He's shown that he's a keeper. Even if Westbrook never develops a jump shot (and I'm not overly hopeful). I don't have a tremendous problem with Watson continuing to start and splitting minutes with Westbrook even though Westbrook is clearly the future. The team isn't going to win either way, so let Westbrook develop at his own pace. He doesn't need to develop bad habits in this transition period, so I don't agree with just throwing him out there to 'figure it out'.
The team is now 1-2 and gets 2 days off before Wednesday night's game with the defending champion Boston Celtics.
No comments:
Post a Comment