OKC Thunder youngsters impressive in victorious preseason debut – Player Grades

A few stats that stood out:

As the match got underway, Thunder Nation braced for what they expect to experience a lot of this season — losing! Instead what the fanbase got to witness was an exciting brand of basketball where the ball zipped around. Last season the team averaged 21.7 assists per game ranking 28th.

In this match, the Thunder collected 23 assists. That might seem like a trivial upgrade — however, then stop to consider only three of the players on the court played together for more than a few minutes last season. (SGA, Mike Muscala, and Hamidou Diallo). The rest of the squad are new to the Thunder either having played for another NBA club, the G-League or are rookies.

A major point to make is while 14 of the 20 players in camp are new, equally important is the head coach is also brand new. Mark Daigneault is the second-youngest head coach in the NBA and his systems showed off that youthful creativity and verve.

An amazing statistical number that punctuated why the Thunder won the match was OKC only took 88 shots (the Spurs took 101) but they shot a highly efficient 48.9 percent from the field. The Spurs shot 39.5 percent which can partially be attributed to the Thunder defense and partially to the rust of the preseason.

Most impressively the Thunder shot a gaudy 54.8 percent from the perimeter (17-31). This was very likely an outlier but considering they shot 35.5 percent from deep last year this night represented a massive upgrade.

Typically Thunderous Intentions post-game offers grades for the starting lineup as well as the top reserve performer and opponent. This time we’re approaching things a little differently given its preseason and 14 of the 20 players on the roster are new.

Instead, these grades will isolate on a trio of new faces.