Thunder/Nets Recap

Yes...I too would have the same look on my face that KD has in the picture to the left if I had just been told that I'd be ejected from a game for the first time in my professional NBA career.  And yet this actually happened, in the Thunder loss to the Nets 110-93 on Wednesday night.  Why this extremely rare event occurred is anyone's guess...if you asked KD - it was merely for saying that a referee Danny Crawford had made "a bad call" by issuing Kendrick Perkins a technical foul in the 2nd quarter.



Is there more to it?  Who can say...but KD's absence didn't help the Thunder's cause.  Without KD (and his 27 points) in the second half, the Thunder had to rely on Russ Westbrook, who came up with 26 and 10 dimes, but offset his nice shooting (11-19 from the field) with 6 TOs.  OKC got 14 points from Serge Ibaka, 11 from KMart, and precious little from anyone else.  The Thunder defense allowed Brooklyn to shoot 50% from the field for the game, certainly a mark that Scott Brooks will harp on at the next practice.  Ibaka had 5 of OKC's total of 8 blocks but the athletic Thunder came up with only 5 thefts in the game and between porous defense and their lack of created turnovers, OKC was in a big hole almost from the get-go.

This loss snapped the Thunder's 12 game home winning streak, and moved their record to 7-3 in the last 10.  They still have the top spot in the West, but only by a slim 1/2 game margin over the Spurs (who themselves have only a half game lead over the Clippers)...its crowded at the top.  Since the Spurs are one of only 4 teams playing tonight (Spurs/Knicks and T'Wolves/Nuggets) the Thunder could drop out of the #1 spot as early as this evening.  OKC plays next on Friday, where they put their 16-3 home record up against the 76'ers, a team themselves coming off a big road win over the LA Lakers recently.  Should be a good one, and you know I'll be watching to see the #ThunderNationRISE.