Grading the Thunder’s terrifying yet tremendous triple overtime victory

OKC Thunder Player Grades

Starting Lineup

Grading Russell Westbrook’s game is extremely difficult. Westbrook’s inability to give Carmelo Anthony the ball in the last 5:21 minutes of the fourth quarter is why the Thunder went scoreless in that stretch. Yet in overtime when it mattered most, Russ delivered. His incredible stamina was a distinct advantage by the third overtime. When OKC needed a rebound he got it. When they needed a bucket, he got it (kinda). That being said…

Carmelo was balling tonight (more on that later), yet he didn’t even get a shot in fourth quarter crunch time – as the floor general that’s Russ’ responsibility to feed the hot hand. Westbrook shot 20 of his 33 attempts from the 5:00 minute mark of the fourth quarter on. If it wasn’t for the Thunder’s devastating defense we’d be talking about another instance where the reigning MVP shot OKC out of the game. Either he finds his shot or he stops shooting. Either way this can’t continue.

The Lowkey MVP was awesome tonight. That’s why it’s such a shame that his feel on the offensive end is so poor. Roberson’s failure to convert on what should have been an easy layup caused the game to go to a third overtime, something a Thunder team playing the next day didn’t necessarily need. While that’s obviously going to be the big discussion point from this game, we have to talk about his calling card tonight.

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Roberson’s defense was sensational tonight. Brilliant. Lovely. Any uber-positive words you can think of, Roberson was that on the defensive end. His sheer will forced multiple Philly turnovers, including a key Joel Embiid strip on a double-team in the second OT. They’ve got to get Roberson active off the ball on offense in order to justify playing him heavy minutes in crunch time.

The fact the Thunder are winning games with their superstars shooting so poorly is a great sign from a team perspective. Three-pointers aren’t the issue for Paul George. After going 5-11 from deep tonight, George is .02% points away from his career high from three point range. It’s his drastic career-low conversion rate from inside the arc (forget about his six games after returning from his gruesome leg injury).

It’s fairly obvious what’s going on – if George isn’t coming off screens he becomes an after-thought on the OKC Thunder offense. His non-threes tend to come off those dreaded isolation possessions, hence why his numbers are so low. The reason he gets graded a tick above Westbrook is because of his work on the defensive end. Everything I said about Roberson rings true with George, less the first 15 minutes where his over-aggressiveness forced him to sit with three quick fouls.

This was supposed to be the Carmelo Anthony breakout game. Melo had his most efficient scoring night of the season, scoring 24 points on 11-17 shooting from the field. It didn’t matter if the 12-time All-Star was double-teamed, he wasn’t missing tonight. Yet everybody that was a part of the game – especially Westbrook, George and Billy Donovan – couldn’t get him the ball. This is a team full of veterans – these things shouldn’t be happening.

Carmelo was solid on the other end, but he did allow Dario Saric to get a few too many good looks from deep tonight. Other than a couple other plays where he could have put in a little more effort, I have nothing else to complain about from Melo. He continues to do a great job of boxing out and keeping opponents off the offensive glass, something that was a major concern coming into the season.

Steven Adams presented Joel Embiid with the biggest defensive challenge he’s faced all season. The fact Embiid dropped 34 points on 11-20 shooting from the field is truly a testament to his greatness. Adams was a brick wall for much of the night, forcing Embiid to pass the ball back to the perimeter on plays clearly meant to be isolation.

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You know how I talked about Westbrook’s stamina earlier? The Big Kiwi even put Russ to shame. Before fouling out Adams was the Thunder’s leader in playing time with a mediocre 51 minutes. Going against Joel Embiid in the post. Holding him to a whopping zero offensive rebounds. It’s time I start the “Steven Adams for Third Team All-NBA campaign” now.

PS. The negative stems from his season-low 25% shooting from the field tonight. Adams wasn’t tasked to score the ball tonight, but you want him to be hitting 50% of his shots if he’s only getting 8 attempts in 51 minutes.