It's no secret that the Oklahoma City Thunder have struggled mightily against the Spurs here in 2025-26.
During their regular-season series, OKC saw their star talents be fully taken out of the game at times due to San Antonio's ridiculous defensive approach, with Shai Gilgeous-Alexander shooting just 31.6 percent from the floor and 20.0 percent from deep when guarded by Stephon Castle, and Chet Holmgren literally making just one shot in total when matched up with Victor Wembanyama.
With this in mind, it's no surprise that the Thunder lost all but one game against their Western Conference foe. Fortunately for them, this time around, they seem to have an ace up their sleeve that should be able to help pick up the slack should they run into such hardships again.
Said ace: Ajay Mitchell.
Ajay Mitchell could be heavily leaned on if Spurs swarm Thunder stars
Ajay Mitchell may have seen his stock rise to stellar sixth man during the regular season, but here in the playoffs, he's broken out into legitimate stardom.
Through eight games played, the sophomore currently finds himself ranked second in the league in plus-minus at plus-17.0 while boasting sensational averages of 18.8 points, 4.9 assists, 4.0 boards, and 1.4 steals while shooting 47.1 percent from the floor and 36.1 percent from deep.
Already, Mitchell has proven more than capable of stepping in when one of Oklahoma City's stars succumbs to hardships, as he's served as the direct rotational replacement for Jalen Williams after he tweaked his hamstring in round one.
Behind his high-end level of play, it shouldn't come as a shock that the Thunder have gone undefeated since.
With J-Dub now set to re-enter the rotation, San Antonio officially has yet another All-NBA talent to game plan around defensively, which, quite frankly, should lead to fewer eyes and overall attention being drawn toward Mitchell.
Like Oklahoma City, the Spurs have a considerable amount of depth and elite defensive pieces to make the Thunder's top talents work every second on the hardwood.
Clearly, as noted earlier, they've proven capable of slowing down the likes of Gilgeous-Alexander and Holmgren, while Williams was held to just 16.5 points on a mere true shooting percentage of 49.0 in the four games he suited up for.
Of course, San Antonio's past head-to-head successes all came prior to Mitchell's current breakout.
The Spurs showed they have the capability of handling the three-headed monster of SGA, Chet, and Dub. However, perhaps this OKC-based Cerberus adding a fourth head in Ajay Mitchell might just prove more than enough to make up for their minus-5.2 point differential.
In order to reach the next round, the Thunder will need their second-year guard to keep up his remarkable postseason momentum and serve as the ultimate compliment to the club's star-studded trio.
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