Destiny Fulfilled

Going back home to Chesapeake Energy Arena, the OKC Thunder continued their recent trend of eliminating previous NBA Championship teams by running away from the Lakers in a 106-90 game that wasn't as close as the final score would indicate. Kobe Bryant came to play for LA...and everyone else pretty much laid down for the Thunder. Steve Blake and Ramon Sessions in particular had their pictures up on the sides of milk cartons since game 1. Bynum was disengaged and looked out of sync the whole game, and Gasol wasn't much better. Indeed, there were several times of obvious miscommunication between the Laker stars, and a visibly frustrated Kobe's answer was to keep gunning to the tune of 42 points on a wide variety of shots.

The Thunder countered with inspired play from Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant (the former who scored a team high 28, and the latter with a solid double double of 25 and 10) and this game ended in the fashion that I think pretty much everyone in both Oklahoma City and Los Angeles knew it would. Rarely does a game show you its turning point so blatantly as this one did on a Russell Westbrook steal and and-1 play, where Russ threw in a crazy underhand scoop shot as Ramon Sessions fouled him to try to stop a fast break dunk. Always an emotional player, Westbrook erupted along with the crowd, and it was pretty much a done deal from that point forward. All that was left was the final ticks off of the game clock.

For the Thunder, it was sweet redemption, having now beaten the last two teams to hand them early playoff exits. And in true "we got this" fashion, by sweeping Dallas and allowing the Lakers only one controversial referee influenced win. The young kids from OKC have just about grown up, and they were eager to show off their newfound composure and level headed play to both of the squads they would face in the first two rounds. Their next opponent is likely to be their biggest challenge yet, as the Spurs have been on an impressive run of their own, getting sweeps in both of their first round matchups against the Jazz and the Clippers on their way to the Western Conference Finals.

Even in the game they lost, you got the feeling that there was something different from last years Thunder team to this one. They knew what to do, and they went out and executed it. They ran their game plan and played at their pace. The rotations were crisp, and the bench did its job. A team that is mostly known as an offensive juggernaut hung its hat on blocked shots, contesting all jumpers, and playing good solid help defense. Even with Kendrick Perkins not at 100%, the Thunder gave the "twin towers" of Gasol and Bynum all kinds of problems, and the Big 3 of OKC did the rest of the damage from there. In fact, one of the best looking lineups was a small ball unit of Derek Fisher, Westbrook, Harden, KD, and Ibaka, being able to switch just about any matchup and take advantage of their mismatches on offense. When the jumpers are falling, and the drives to the hoop draw fouls, this year's OKC team is very hard to beat.

Game 1 of the WCF starts Sunday, in San Antonio. #ThunderNationRISE