Bob Donnan-US PRESSWIRE

The United States will take on Spain in the gold medal game at 10 a.m. EST this morning. The U.S. and Spain are meeting in the Olympic gold medal game for the second straight Olympics with the U.S. winning in 2008 118-107.

Team USA and Spain were the two favorites in these Olympics and were expected to meet in this game. The United States rolled through their competition winning all seven games by an average of 35.7 points per game.

Things didn’t go quite as planned for Spain who lost twice in group play to Russia then intentionally to Brazil so as to avoid the United States until the gold medal game. That worked out well for Spain who beat France 66-59 in the quarterfinals then knocked off Russia 67-59 in the semis.

Spain is considered the greatest test for Team USA so far. They may not have looked their best so far in the Olympics but we can expect to see them play their best basketball today.

Pau Gasol is averaging 18.4 points per game to lead Spain while brother Marc is second on the team scoring 12.0 points per game.

Spain will have a significant size advantage vs. the U.S. as they also bring Serge Ibaka off the bench, who is only playing 14.1 minutes per game and averaging 7.4 points and 3.7 rebounds per game.

Team USA’s lack of size was supposed to be a big weakness for them entering the Olympics but they have made up for it with great 3-point shooting. As a team, the U.S. is shooting .445 percent from three in the Olympics and taking 36.6 threes per game.

Kevin Durant is leading the team averaging 18.0 points and shooting .558 percent from deep. Carmelo Anthony is second on the team at 17.4 points per game while shooting .525 percent from three.

LeBron James has also come on of late for the U.S. notching the first ever triple-double in U.S. Olympic history in the quarterfinals vs. Australia. He’s averaging 12.4 points, 5.4 rebounds and is leading the team with 5.9 assists per game.

Two big factors will decide this game: 3-point shooting and size. Spain is fully capable of outplaying the U.S. in both areas and will need to, to have a chance at winning.

We know they will have the size advantage but they will need to take advantage of it scoring from the post. That will open up the 3-point shot which Spain has struggled with these Olympics shooting it at just .328 percent.

They have some players who can heat up from deep though, most notably Rudy Fernandez and Juan Carlos Navarro. Spain should be able to nullify Team USA’s excellent ball pressure defense with their experienced guards, Jose Calderon and Sergio Rodriguez.

This is the game we have all been waiting for. It’s the only right way to decide the gold medal in basketball, having these two teams play a 40-minute game. The U.S. will be favored and rightfully so but Spain has as good a chance as anyone to pull off the upset.

This will also be the final game as head coach of Team USA for Mike Krzyzewski. Krzyzewski has led the United States to a 61-1 record under him since he took over in 2006 and was there when they won gold in Beijing four years ago. 61-2 would be considered a failure for Coach K.

USA vs. Spain is the gold medal matchup everyone wanted to see. The United States are of course the favorites to bring home gold while Spain has always been considered their greatest competition.

Team USA has won all seven of its games in the Olympics so far by an average margin of 35.7 points per game. Spain has been far less impressive losing twice in pool play and looking weak in each of their last two games in the medal round.

The United States has passed some tests so far, beating Argentina twice and surviving a close scare vs. Lithuania but Spain should still be their toughest battle yet.

Here are five reasons why Spain might upset the United States in the gold medal game.

Spain is bigger

Let’s start with the most obvious one here. Spain has a significant size advantage over the U.S. and they intend to take advantage of it as much as possible. Spain starts the Gasol brothers and then brings Serge Ibaka and Felipe Reyes off the bench.

The U.S. will start Tyson Chandler as their only big and use Kevin Love too but mostly plays LeBron James, Kevin Durant and Carmelo Anthony at power forward. The U.S. has outrebounded their opponents by over 10 boards per game in the Olympics but that is mostly because they are shooting a far higher percentage.

The U.S. is definitely weak inside as we saw in their games vs. Lithuania and Argentina, when they play without a rim protector their opponent will get a lot of relatively easy looks at the rim.

Spain will pound it inside on offense and pack in their zone on defense. This is closer to the international style and they will have an advantage. Mismatches do go both ways though and Team USA will have to make sure they take advantage by featuring their more skilled forwards in positions where they can be effective against slower, bigger defenders.

3-point shooting

Team USA has lived by the three and they’ve won by it so far in the Olympics. They are attempting 36.6 threes per game and making .445 percent of them. That’s off the charts but there is always a chance even for Team USA to go cold from behind the line tomorrow morning.

Durant and Anthony become very important in this regard as they have led Team USA in 3-point shooting. Durant is shooting .558 percent from three in the Olympics and Anthony .525. They are Team USA’s two leading scorers as well.

Spain has been on the opposite end in terms of 3-point shooting success in the Olympics. They’re shooting just .328 percent as a team with some of their best guys really struggling.

Rudy Fernandez is third on the team in scoring and shooting .367 percent. Juan Carlos Navarro is shooting .333 percent and Jose Calderon .348 percent. Even Pau Gasol has been shooting the three for them, making just 5-for-15 in total.

Spain is fully capable though of heating up from three in any game as they showed in the second half of their semifinal game vs. Russia. They will need to do that and pray that Team USA has an off shooting night to pull off the upset.

40-minute game

The games in these Olympics are eight minutes shorter than NBA games. That means there is greater chance for an upset and less time to erase mistakes made early in the game. Spain is more experience playing this style and will surely try and take advantage of it to the fullest mostly by controlling the pace of the game.

Fortunately for Team USA, Spain hasn’t been getting off to great starts lately and will definitely need to if they plan to win the gold medal. Spain should be up for this game more than any other though and we should see a more concentrated effort from them. Pau Gasol admitted himself that Spain has been looking ahead too much in the Olympics so far. That won’t be the case tomorrow.

Team USA has consistently seen teams play their best games against them, at least for spurts. With the game obviously being close early, Spain should show us their best game from the start. We’ve seen Argentina unable to sustain this for 40 minutes but Spain may be able to.

Officiating

The officials haven’t exactly been on the side of Team USA in these Olympics as per usual. The rules are a little different and there are some things that Team USA will simply never get used to. We’ve seen a lot of Team USA players called for traveling or called for very questionable fouls.

You only get five fouls before fouling out in international play and that could play a huge factor. Chandler will be more important than ever in this matchup vs. Spain but he has in every game gotten into some sort of foul trouble. One would expect that to happen again vs. Spain and that could be very bad news for Team USA.

Team USA players don’t get star treatment either overseas. LeBron and Durant will be asked to defend Spain’s post players some and will be vulnerable to some easy foul calls. If one or both of them has to sit on the bench more than normal, Spain will have that much better of a chance to pull off the upset.

Kobe

Kobe is probably Spain’s best chance for beating Team USA. Kobe has been for the most part pretty horrible in the Olympics although he has been better in the last two games. We know that Kobe will be shooting in the gold medal game and if he’s not hitting, that will put Team USA in a tough spot.

Coach K will more than likely play Kobe at least half of the game and probably more and he will have him out there during crunch time, if there is one. Kobe has the potential to shoot Team USA out of the game or Spain into the game if he looks like the Kobe we saw in pool play.

The same goes for Anthony as well. Both he and Kobe are going to take shots, probably a lot of bad ones, and if they’re not falling, Spain will be that much closer to Team USA.

The margin for error will be the smallest for Team USA tomorrow morning. They’ve been able to overcome their imperfections so far but Spain is the real test.

It was a very ugly game in the first half especially by Spain as they shot very poorly from the outside and Russia was matching their physicality inside.

Spain got their act together in the second half, hitting some threes early in the third quarter and that really seemed to get the rest of their game going as well. Russia doesn’t have a prolific offense and once Spain took the lead couldn’t find enough to come back.

Spain advances to the gold medal game for the second straight Olympics and will await the winner of USA-Argentina who play later today.

Here are grades for both teams’ players:

Spain players

Pau Gasol – 34 minutes, 16 points, 12 rebounds, 2 blocks – A

Pau was quiet in the first half with the rest of Spain but made some big plays in the second including a 3-pointer. He didn’t seem to ever establish position well enough in the post but still led Spain in scoring.

Marc Gasol – 29 minutes, 11 points, 4 rebounds, 2 blocks – B+

The offense went through Marc in the fourth quarter and he delivered, scoring some and always looking to make other things happen too with the pass. He and his brother didn’t hookup as much with their great interior passing in this game but they came up big when they needed to and grinded out the victory.

Rudy Fernandez – 29 minutes, 11 points, 4 rebounds, 2 assists – B

Fernandez didn’t have much going in this game besides the three 3-pointers he hit. With the score so low, all of them were big though and really got Spain going. He eventually fouled out and didn’t make some of the spectacular plays he’s sometimes capable of.

Jose Calderon – 33 minutes, 14 points, 3 assists – B+

Calderon had some bad turnovers late but the game was pretty much in hand by that point. He made four threes for the game and a few really big ones during Spain’s run. The Russia defense was good so the assist total was low but he definitely played big down the stretch for Spain.

Juan Carlos Navarro – 20 minutes, 4 points, 3 assists – C

Navarro is described as a player that plays big in big games but that was not the case today. Russia kept him in tact pretty easily and he only attempted one three in the game which he missed. He had a few nice assists but doesn’t have the explosiveness he used to, to create much else.

Serge Ibaka – 7 minutes, 2 points, 2 rebounds – C+

Ibaka barely played in this one and didn’t at all in the second half as Spain went with Felipe Reyes as a sub for the Gasol brothers instead of Ibaka. His basket in the first half was a nice one finishing with a foul on the fast break but his overall impact was pretty minimal. He played with a lot of energy and it’s a little curious why he doesn’t play more. Expect to see a little more of him if Spain sees the U.S. in the gold medal game.

Sergio Llull – 21 minutes, 7 points, 4 rebounds – B+

Llull has been great for Spain in the medal round so far. He plays with so much energy and is always looking to make things happen. Spain needed the lift he provided today especially and he made all three of his shots. He’s an underrated piece for this Spain team.

Russia players

Andrei Kirilenko – 34 minutes, 10 points, 8 rebounds, 3 blocks – B-

Kirilenko was just 2-for-12 from the field but does so many other things too it wasn’t the worst thing in the world for Russia. They did need him to step up as Spain was coming back and he struggled to do so. He also missed a few key free throws late which could have given Russia a chance to come back in the final moments. He had a great Olympics leading Russia to a pretty impressive record but this was not his best game.

Alexey Shved – 26 minutes, 2 points, 7 assists – C+

Shved also really struggled from the field shooting 1-for-6 and 0-for-4 from deep. His jump shot has been off all Olympics but he has made up for it some with his playmaking. He did a nice job with seven assists but like Kirilenko, was needed to put the ball in the hoop more and came up short for his country.

Alexandre Kaun – 24 minutes, 14 points, 5 rebounds – A

Kaun played big time for Russia in this one holding his own with the Gasol brothers and leading Russia in scoring. He was very good rolling to the rim and within Russia’s offense and thanks to their good playmakers, he was found often finishing with dunks.

Viktor Khryapa – 34 minutes, 2 points, 4 assists, 6 rebounds – C

Khryapa was cold shooting today as well at just 1-for-6 and 0-for-4 on threes. He made some good plays as a playmaker at the top of the key like he usually does with the four assists but Russia needed a better shooting performance overall and from him in this one to win.

Timofey Mozgov – 14 minutes, 4 points, 2 rebounds – C

It’s interesting that Mozgov doesn’t start or play more for this team. He had been pretty good in the Olympics so far but was mostly a no show in this one. Russia went with the stretch fours and Kaun at center rather than trying to go bigger with Mozgov.

Anton Ponkrashov – 29 minutes, 10 points, 2 assists – B+

Ponkrashov stepped up his game vs. Spain much like he did in their first meeting. His scoring was huge with not much else working for Russia but like the rest of the team, he cooled off as Spain ran away with the game in the second half.

Sergey Monya – 25 minutes, 9 points, 2 steals – B+

When Monya was hitting threes in the first half Russia was looking like they were going to win. But they couldn’t sustain it for the entire game.

Vitaly Fridzon – 12 minutes, 8 points, 1 steal – C+

Fridzon lit up Spain for 24 points in their first meeting but was much less of a factor in this one. He was still fine in the little time he played making 2-of-3 threes. Russia went with more defense and Shved over Fridzon for most of this game.

Russia finished pool play as the top seed from Pool B, beating out Spain after winning their game 77-74 on a last-second 3-point shot. Spain led 20-2 in that game before Russia’s Vitaliy Fridzon got hot scoring 24 points to lead Russia back for the win.

Russia went on to beat Lithuania in the quarterfinals as Spain came from behind to beat France and advance.

Russia has been led by Andrei Kirilenko who is playing some of the best basketball of his life of late. Kirilenko is leading Russia averaging 18.3 points and 7.3 rebounds per game while shooting .587 percent from the field. Kirilenko was quiet in Russia’s win over Spain though with just eight points on 2-of-8 shooting.

Spain was cold from deep in that game going just 3-for-15 and really has struggled with the 3-point shot so far in these Olympics, shooting it at just .314 percent. They are capable of much better though with players like Juan Carlos Navarro, Rudy Fernandez and Jose Calderon.

The strength of Spain comes on the inside though led by the Gasol brothers. Pau is leading the team averaging 18.8 points per game while Marc is averaging 12.2 points. They are also combining for 12.1 rebounds per game.

Spain had to get past a very tough French defense in the quarterfinal that may have served as a sort of wakeup call for them. Spain really turned up the intensity in the fourth quarter to come from behind to win while holding France to just six points in the final period.

Russia has some bodies to contend with Spain though in Timofey Mozgov and Victory Khryapa who have both been solid in the Olympics so far.

The X-factor for Russia will be guard Alexey Shved who has been good in the Olympics so far averaging 10.7 points and 5.5 assists per game but has uncharacteristically struggled with the 3-point shot shooting just .259 percent. Shved is a big time playmaker for this team though and will have to play big for Russia to win today.

Spain will need a bigger game from Navarro than what he’s shown in the Olympics so far. Navarro is a little banged up and looking older these days as his jumper and runner have been a little off in these games. He’s a big game player though and expect him to show up today.

Even though Russia beat Spain already, Spain is still the favorite to win here. They just have too much balance on their roster and the skilled size down low should help them prevail. Russia has made a habit of proving people wrong though and they will give another valiant effort today.

No one wanted to win that game despite what the players had to say.

“No. Never,” Spain point guard Jose Calderon told ESPN.com when asked if Spain wanted to lose. “This is not our team, this is not the way we play, this is not the way. We’ve been together since I don’t know how many years, and we always play to win. Always.”

By the time the game was ready to start, it was known exactly who each team would play if they won or lost. The winner would move on as the 2-seed to a bracket that included Team USA as the 1-seed and Argentina as the 3-seed. The loser went to the side with Russia as the 1-seed and France as the 2-seed.

It’s not hard to see which bracket was more desirable to be in.

Before the game began it was announced that Brazil’s starting center Nene would sit out the game with plantar fasciitis. In a must-win game, Nene never would have missed a game vs. Spain especially because Brazil would need all the help they could get on the frontline.

Spain responded to Nene’s absence by playing their big guns few minutes. Pau Gasol played 24 minutes and Marc Gasol played 25. The brothers combined to score 45 points on 16-of-21 shooting.

Spain led 66-57 after three quarters but then was outscored 31-16 in the fourth to ultimately lose 88-82.

Rudy Fernandez only played 15 minutes and missed his only shot attempt. Jose Calderon played just 14 minutes while Serge Ibaka, who hadn’t been playing much all Olympics, logged 21 minutes and scored 14 points with six rebounds and three blocks.

Leandro Barbosa would lead Brazil with 23 points before sitting during the final minutes.

The game was clearly trying to be lost and by both teams. That’s not exactly what Olympic competition is all about right? Maybe it is.

The goal is to win a gold medal. Losing this game has put Spain in a better position to do so. It’s no guarantee or anything but there’s no question that Russia/France is weaker competition than USA/Argentina.

The problem, if there is one, is with the system or the amount of competition out there. There is a clear-cut difference in talent between Argentina and France despite France beating Argentina in pool play. Spain would never choose to play Argentina instead of France if they could, not to mention try and avoid the U.S. at all costs.

There is no real incentive to acquire a higher seed either because there’s no homecourt advantage. This will of course never be the case in the Olympics and this is really what we get with pool play.

Pool play is fair because it fairly seeds teams but since it is not a straight up elimination tournament, tanking will sometimes be beneficial. The only way to stop this would be to change the system.

Until then, Spain played it smart and Brazil will be left shaking their heads in the coming days as they try and get past Argentina and the U.S. to make it to a gold medal game.

It was very clear no one really wanted to win this game. The loser would avoid the United States and Argentina until a potential gold medal game.

Spain led 66-57 after three quarters and then was outscored 31-16 in the fourth. Pau Gasol played just 24 minutes and had 25 points on 9-of-11 shooting. Marc Gasol played 25 minutes and had 20 points on 7-of-10 shooting.

Rudy Fernandez only played 15 minutes and missed his only shot of the game and Jose Calderon played only 14 minutes.

On Brazil’s side, Nene did not play but the rest of their NBA players played close to normal minutes.

Leandro Barbosa led Brazil with 23 points in the game and went 2-of-2 from three. Brazil was 8-for-17 on threes in the game and Spain struggled again going just 4-for-13 from beyond the arc.

Serge Ibaka came off the bench for Spain and played 21 minutes, scoring 14 points to go with six rebounds and three blocks.

The matchups for the medal round are basically set now unless Argentina blows out Team USA by 35-plus points. Spain will be the 3-seed playing France in the quarterfinal. Brazil will be the 2-seed and play Argentina on the other side of the bracket.

Team USA will play 4-seed Australia and 1-seed Russia will play Lithuania.

Geoff Burke-US PRESSWIRE

Who wants to lose more?

Spain and Brazil will play today at 3 p.m. EST and neither team will be better off winning the game.

The winner of the game will come out of Pool B as the 2-seed in the same bracket where Team USA will likely be the 1-seed and Argentina the 3-seed. The loser will get to be in the bracket where Russia and France are the top seeds.

This game will be very interesting and don’t be surprised if players like Pau Gasol or Leandro Barbosa aren’t playing as many minutes as they could.

Spain and Brazil are both 3-1 in pool play so far with both losing close games to Russia. Spain and Brazil are two of the biggest threats to the United States in these Olympics and would both love to not see the mighty U.S. until a potential gold medal game.

A big reason why these teams matchup so well with Team USA is that they both have NBA size. Spain featured the Gasol brothers as well as Serge Ibaka and Felipe Reyes. Brazil has Nene, Anderson Varejao and Tiago Splitter in their corner.

The point guard position is a strength for both Spain and Brazil as well. Spain starts Jose Calderon and brings Juan Carlos Navarro off the bench. Brazil has maybe the best point guard not in the NBA in Marcelinho Huertas who is averaging 11.0 points and 6.2 assists per game in the Olympics.

This matchup is a very close one that is only hard to predict today because both teams could very well be trying to lose. If they both were trying to win however, Spain has to have the slight edge but it is real close.

Pau Gasol is averaging 19.5 points per game so far in the Olympics and looks very comfortable in his clear alpha dog role with Spain. Rudy Fernandez has played pretty well too averaging 10.8 points per game and Spain is just a little more balanced and experienced than Brazil.

Barbosa is leading Brazil averaging 13.0 points per game while Splitter is averaging 12.0. They don’t have quite the same outside shooting ability that Spain does which could very well be the difference in this matchup.

It’s kind of hard to say what to expect with this game later today. The Olympics are all about competition but we might not see that exactly today with this game. Ultimately every team wants to win a gold medal and if losing first betters those chances than there really shouldn’t be anything wrong with that.

Deng finished with 26 points, nine rebounds and eight assists for the host country which is now 0-3 so far in the Olympics.

Spain improved to 3-0 as Pau Gasol once again led the way with 17 points and four assists. Calderon scored 19 points and Marc Gasol chipped in with 12.

Serge Ibaka came off the bench to score five points to go with four rebounds and two blocks.

Deng got some help from teammate Joel Freeland who just recently signed a 3-year deal with the Portland Trailblazers. Freeland scored 25 points and had eight rebounds for Great Britain today.

A barrage of late threes by Great Britain in the final minutes kept hope alive for them until the final buzzer. Spain struggled from the perimeter on the other hand making just 4-of-17 in the game.

Spain also struggled from the free throw line going just 21-for-32.

Spain sits atop Pool B with a 3-0 record and will play Russia who is also 3-0 so far in their next game on Saturday.

Spain was led by Pau Gasol who had 21 points, 10 rebounds and three assists and Serge Ibaka who scored 17 points off the bench to go with five rebounds and three blocks.

China who was a heavy underdog coming into the game would not go away because of a great game from Yi Jianlian who scored 30 points on 13-of-19 shooting to go with 12 rebounds.

Spain, who is not known for their defense, allowed 51.6 percent shooting by the Chinese but made up for it shooting 57.1 percent from the field themselves including 11-for-19 from 3-point land.

Jose Calderon had the hot hand early making three early 3-pointers and would finish with 12 points in the game.

China of course no longer features Yao Ming but they did have another legendary Chinese center dawn the court in Wang Zhizhi who had one of those “throwback Wang” games scoring 15 points while stepping out and knocking down a pair of treys.

Spain was not necessarily at their best in the game turning the ball over an unnecessarily 13 times against a mediocre Chinese defense.

Spain will have to play better to ensure winning the rest of their games in pool play and getting the top seed so as to avoid the United States until a potential gold medal game.

Spain will play Australia next on Tuesday and then against Great Britain Thursday.

Jerry Lai-US PRESSWIRE

Spain comes into the 2012 London Olympics viewed as less of a threat to challenge the United States for the gold medal than they were four years ago.

In 2008, Spain was looked at as the team with the best shot to knock of the United States who were no longer unbeatable, winning bronze in the 2004 games. The U.S. Redeem Team would come out on top in the 2008 gold medal game beating Spain.

Spain played Team USA earlier this week in an exhibition game and lost 100-78. Spain treated the game as a friendly however and we can expect more competition from them in the Olympics.

Spain opens up the 2012 Olympic Basketball pool play against China today with the tip at 11:45 a.m. EST. Spain is considered the favorite in Pool B and is ranked 2nd in the world by FIBA. China is ranked 10th in the world but still not considered much of a threat against a team like Spain.

Spain brings an impressive cast to London in 2012 led of course by Pau Gasol. Pau will be joined by his brother Marc on the inside as well as Oklahoma City Thunder power forward Serge Ibaka.

Ibaka is able to play for Spain as their one naturalized player because although he was not born there, he became a citizen while playing in their professional league a few years back.

The inside is definitely the strength of this Spain team and the biggest thing that will give them an edge over the U.S. but they also have pretty good balance elsewhere.

In the backcourt they will start Jose Calderon at point guard who was fourth in the NBA last season in assists per game. Calderon will be joined by one of the all-time greats from the Euroleague, Juan Carlos Navarro.

A big loss for Spain in these Olympics is that they will not be playing with Ricky Rubio who suffered a torn ACL last season and is still rehabbing. Rubio first came onto the national scene back in 2008 in the Olympics for Spain when he was just 17 years old.

At the wing positions Spain is solid too led by Rudy Fernandez and Victor Claver. Fernandez has played in the NBA for the past few seasons and made a name for himself as a fearless shooter and scorer while Claver will join the Portland Trailblazers next season.

China meanwhile has much less NBA experience on their roster. They are led by Yi Jianlian who now plays for the Dallas Mavericks. Yi was a high lottery pick in the NBA once upon a time but has jumped from team to team in his short NBA career having a tough time finding a good fit.

Yi only played in 30 games for Dallas last season. His best season was in 2009-10 for New Jersey when he averaged 12.0 points and 7.2 rebounds per game for the Nets.

Yi doesn’t have a ton of help but NBA fans will recognize the starting center for China, Wang Zhizhi. Zhizhi is a stretch bit who played some in the NBA spending most of his time hoisting up threes.

Sun Yue will start in China’s backcourt and is one of their best guards. Yue played for the Los Angeles Lakers one season back in 2008-09 and won an NBA title with them but only played in 10 games.

China will be overmatched by Spain in just about every area on the floor. Spain is an experienced bunch confident that they can compete for a gold medal this year. China will not be a team capable of standing in their way.

Spain will be very concerned with winning every game in pool play and winning by as big of a margin as possible. They want the 1-seed so they can avoid the United States until a potential gold medal game.

In Pool B, Spain has a little competition in Brazil and Russia for the top seed. If somehow there is a 3-way tie at the top of the pool, winning margin becomes the tie-breaker so expect to see Spain going all out to win every game starting today against China.

Steve Dykes-US PRESSWIRE

Thunder (3-game losing streak)
107.2 Offensive Efficiency (2nd)
100.1 Defensive Efficiency (9th)
95.6 Pace (6th)
57.0 True Shooting % (1st)
51.3 Rebound Rate (6th)

Raptors (1-game losing streak)
99.2 Offensive Efficiency (24th)
101.9 Defensive Efficiency (15th)
91.9 Pace (24th)
52.2 True Shooting % (19th)
50.6 Rebound Rate (11th)

The Thunder are coming into tonight’s matchup having lost three games in a row for the first time all season. Fortunately, the get to host the Toronto Raptors tonight.

The Raptors are one of the league’s worst while the Thunder will be searching to get back on track tonight.

In the last three games, Russell Westbrook has struggled most for Oklahoma City shooting only around 32 percent from the field. James Harden’s production has also been down as he’s averaged just 12.0 points per game over the last three.

Kevin Durant is coming off a 44-point performance in Indiana. The 44 points was the second most he has scored in a game this season. Toronto isn’t a likely candidate to slow him down tonight.

So far in April, Toronto has lived up to their improved defense allowing just 85.3 points per contest. The Thunder have only been averaging around 92 per game over the last three while scoring 102.9 during the course of the season.

Containing Andrea Bargnani will be the main focus of the Thunder defense tonight. The stretch big is averaging 23.6 points per game over his last five and will draw out either Kendrick Perkins or Serge Ibaka toward the perimeter.

The Raptors should have more problems with their defense as legendary matador Jose Calderon will have to try and slow down Westbrook. If ever there was a matchup to get Westbrook back on track this may be it.

The Thunder have had some issues this season taking opponents like this lightly but on the heels of a three-game losing streak, Oklahoma City should be hungry for a win.