The OKC Thunder went into Houston and played like a team ready for the regular season to end, not for the playoffs to begin.
Take a look at any statistic from Sunday’s Game One debacle and there’s a good chance Houston outperformed Oklahoma City. Rebounding, one of the things OKC is better than everybody else in the league at? The Rockets won the battle of the boards 59-41. Points in the paint, the other thing OKC is better at than everybody else in the league? Houston won 62-38.
I’m not here to point fingers or anything but that’s on the Thunder big men. On multiple occasions smaller Houston guards would slash through the paint and simply out-jump an OKC big for a rebound. And when they got the ball down low on offense they seemed afraid to go up strong.
Steven Adams cannot finish with 6 points and 5 rebounds. Taj Gibson cannot record 1 rebound in 21 minutes of playing time. When Russell Westbrook is the only player with multiple offensive rebounds, things don’t tend to end well for the Thunder.
To put it simply: the OKC Thunder were outplayed tonight. James Harden outplayed Russell Westbrook, the Houston supporting cast outplayed Oklahoma City’s and even Mike D’Antoni outcoached Billy Donovan.
Still, there’s more to learn from last night then the couple of notes I mentioned above. In fact there’s at least five significant takeaways that could change the rest of the series if addressed correctly.
Join me.