Is it Time For the OKC Thunder to Panic?

Q: Does the Thunder’s schedule lend itself to a playoff berth?

Ramil: Out of the Thunder’s remaining 36 games, 20 of those are against opponents ranked in the top eight for their respective Conferences, not including two games against the Pelicans. They also have eight back-to-back sets to play, as well as 15 games away from the ‘Peake.

Currently at 23-23, it’s largely been estimated that a 51-win season is required just to make the Western Conference playoffs. That would require going 28-8 the rest of the way. With two games against each of these opponents – New Orleans, Memphis, San Antonio, Houston, Dallas, Portland, the Clippers and Chicago – not to mention matchups against Toronto and Atlanta, that task isn’t just daunting…it’s impossible. This assumes OKC can knock off “easy” opponents with little difficulty but, after getting embarassed by the lowly New York Knicks on Wednesday, there are clearly no guarantees in this schedule.

Fielder: Granted, playing in the West is never ideal. Given that 20 of the Thunder’s next 36 games are against current playoff teams, they certainly have their work cut out for them. However, they still largely control their own destiny.With two games left against both New Orleans and Phoenix, they can swing their deficit in the playoff race against those two teams in a hurry.

Furthermore, I’m starting to reject the notion that it will take 50-51 wins to get into the playoffs. Rather I’m starting to look at the Thunder’s playoff scenario as they simply need to be one game better than New Orleans and three games better than Phoenix over the next 36 games. That isn’t impossible. In fact, if you just look at what OKC has managed to do with their roster at full strength, it feels like it would actually be an upset if they don’t surpass the Pelicans and the Suns. With Kevin Durant in the lineup, the Thunder are 14-6 (0.700). If they hold to that pace (which seems logical given that most of those games were on the road), they will finish the season at 48-34. The Suns are currently on pace for a 46-36 record, the Pelicans on pace for 43-39 (despite Anthony Davis currently posting the greatest PER season of all time, per Bill Simmons). If this holds, the Thunder should actually slide into the playoffs quite comfortably.

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