Thursday night, the OKC Thunder had an opportunity to wrap up their semifinal series against the Denver Nuggets and, if accomplished, receive ample time to rest and recover before a round-three matchup against the waiting Minnesota Timberwolves.
Sadly, things did not go according to plan, as they were outmatched by the Nuggets out at Ball Arena in virtually every major area of play and, ultimately, fell by a final score of 119-107.
Many factors played a role in Oklahoma City's depleting Game 6 demise.
From early foul troubles for key players to Jalen Williams' putrid scoring night in what needed to be a doubter-silencing performance, examples of shortcomings were essentially a dime a dozen.
However, easily up there as one of the most concerning struggles from this Thunder team during the contest was Isaiah Hartenstein's lackluster success rate in securing second-chance opportunities against the likes of Nikola Jokic.
Nikola Jokic made Thunder big's offensive rebounding game nonexistent
No, this is not meant to be a hit piece on Hartenstein.
Since being appointed as the primary defensive weapon against the Nuggets superstar following Game 1, he's undeniably been one of the most important members of coach Mark Daigneault's rotation.
With that being said, all of his positive contributions in the series thus far can't inherently cancel out the fact that he has been somewhat of a non-factor in the offensive rebounding department over the last two games.
After having established himself as one of the best board-gobblers on the offensive end throughout his debut season with the Thunder, ranking ninth in the entire league with 3.2 per game, Hartenstein has found himself getting boxed out somewhat effortlessly by Jokic as of late.
In Games 5 & 6 combined, the big man has only managed to pull down four second-chance opportunities for OKC while Denver's centerpiece has collected a whopping 23 defensive rebounds during the same stretch.
Sure, sometimes the ball bounces in unfortunate ways, which, in turn, makes securing an offensive board quite a tricky task. However, when watching the game, on far too many occasions, we see Jokic bodying I-Hart and preventing him from getting into a proper position to snatch the ball down in the first place.
Seeing a stark discrepancy such as this is far from complementary to their typical way of play, as Oklahoma City has become rather known for their second-chance offensive abilities, finishing the regular season ranked within the top-12 in such points on a nightly basis.
With such struggles by Hartenstein, it should come as no surprise that the Thunder were outscored 23-9 in second-chance points in Game 6 and have been outscored 118-92 in the series as a whole.
Clearly, this has been an ongoing problem throughout this semifinal showdown, and now, heading into a winner-take-all Game 7, it seems that OKC may not have enough time to fix this particular dilemma.
As they did in Games 2, 4, & 5, hopefully the Thunder can find a way to overcome such a lopsided battle on Sunday afternoon.