In the News is excited for the return of the OKC Thunder tonight. No matter the outcome we’ll see where the team mentality sits after a quarter of the season.
Happy gameday Thunder Nation! Throw out the last 19 games – the season starts today. Every game is a new opportunity for this talented roster to find their perfect equilibrium. If you’re a daily In the News follower you’re probably surprised right now. Isn’t it great what three days without watching this team can do? Hopefully the players feel the same way.
Previewing the Magic matchup
Luckily for Oklahoma City their return to the court is against a struggling Orlando team. The Magic come into the game with a nine-game losing streak, in large part because they can’t stop anybody. They’ve given up 100 points in all but one game during that streak – it’s the perfect team for this Thunder team to gain a little confidence. Shoutout TI writer Yams for stepping up after a confusion around dates/games and providing us with a great preview to tonight.
"As for the Magic, they’ve been terrible on defense over the past nine games."
NBA analysts give their thoughts on the OK3 difficulties
It’s crazy that four writers from NBA.com can provide four extremely different reasons why the Thunder aren’t meshing and all be correct. OKC’s problems are vast yet fixable. They’ve shown flashes on both ends of the floor, but they haven’t put it together for an entire game. That includes last Wednesday against the Warriors.
"I don’t know that 19 games is enough time to figure out how to get around a new city (for Carmelo Anthony and Paul George), let alone figure out your chemistry if you’re “the OK3”."
Carmelo tells a joke…that’s kinda serious
This one actually hurt. Listen to what Carmelo has to say before you read anything else.
Carmelo Anthony was asked if has ever played on a team that’s struggled to meet expectations: “You watch the last couple seasons?” pic.twitter.com/hdqv13G4cg
— Fred Katz (@FredKatz) November 28, 2017
Hopefully this was a moment of euphoria for Carmelo – maybe his teams constant struggles has something to do with his style of play. A team’s rhythm can be thrown off by one ball-stopper; the Thunder currently have three. If just one of them makes a concerted effort for a more free-flowing it could go along way to solving our troubles.
That’s it for today’s issue of Thunder in the News. I’ll be back tonight with your post game player grades – make sure you check our homepage for all of our great content.