OKC Thunder clutch victory features ‘Good Dennis’, Big Kiwi and reserves stepping up: 3 takeaways
OKC Thunder swing clutch time to their advantage for the second time in three games as they beat the Pelicans. Three takeaways from the win.
For the second time in three games, the OKC Thunder found a way to turn clutch time into winning time. After shedding their bad habit of getting out to poor starts the Thunder built up what would ballon to a 16-point lead as Darius Bazley dropped in a layup at 5:44 of the second quarter.
Unfortunately, fixing every bad habit doesn’t typically all happen in one outing as was the case for the home team. OKC acquiesced to their second bad habit of coming out of the half time break cold. This resulted in the New Orleans Pelicans taking over the lead and by the time E’Twaun Moore hit his 3-point shot at 9:53 of the final frame the lead had built to a margin of eight.
But on this night something occurred that Thunder Nation would love to see more of – we got the ‘GOOD Dennis Schroder‘.
‘The Good Dennis’
Hey, I’ll own it, I’ve had more than my fair share of rants over the Thunder point guard not playing in a certain manner. Through 18 games he’s been more ‘Dennis the Menace’ than ‘Dennis the Good’.
What’s so frustrating is nights like this where we get to witness how special Dennis Schroder can be when he decides to manage the game with more balance. His 25 points were the main reason for the win, particularly his 12 in the final frame. The best part was the scoring was interspersed with seven assists and they came within the flow of the game.
The question begs to be asked – is it a coincidence the Thunder had 26 assists on a night when Schroder was moving the ball? Or that the Thunder collected only 19 assists in Portland when Schroder dished precisely ZERO dimes?
To that end, I’d rather he take less than 24 shots and disperse at least six of those to his teammates but at least on this one occasion he gets a pass since many of his teammates simply couldn’t get their shots to fall. Perhaps more emphasis needs to be placed on running the pick and roll with Steven Adams and Nerlens Noel more frequently but that’s another article for another day. And yes – I DID see that lob pass which didn’t clear the heads of the opponents, but I’m focusing on the good Dennis today.
As for this win – Schroder gets the hat tip and a full-on pleading for him to replicate these efforts moving forward because the team is a different club when he balances scoring and shot distribution.