Season 48, Game 30
Oklahoma City 114, San Antonio 106
18-12, 7th in the West

There were no Spurs Christmas presents today. (Unless you count Bonner and Belinelli dunks, both of which were awesome.) Oklahoma City came into San Antonio and knocked the team around.

Don’t let the score fool you; save for one really good stretch to end the 3rd quarter, the Thunder completely outplayed the Spurs. Their athleticism has always given the Spurs fits; when you throw in better effort on top of that athleticism, it’s destruction and chaos for San Antonio.

No where was this increased desire more prevalent than on the boards. In the first half, the Thunder had 13 offensive rebounds to the Spurs 12 defensive rebounds. That’s almost an impossible stat, to have more offensive boards than the opposing team has defensive. Essentially, the Thunder got a second chance to score on half of all possessions. That is not good.

The Spurs cleaned it up in the second half a bit, but every defensive possession was still a struggle and rarely ended cleanly.

You know who helps with rebounding? Kawhi Leonard. Missing him hurts in so many areas of the game on both ends of the floor.

But you know what Kawhi can’t help with? Guarding Russell Westbrook. Holy heck, was Westbrook a tear today. His speed and sheer athletic ability are overwhelming. Even when he’s missing shots, he’s completely destroying defenses just by the force of his abilities. Once he starts making the shots? Forget about it. Westbrook was a wrecking ball today, the impetus behind the Thunder win.

The Spurs have nobody to stop–or even slow down–Westbrook. Parker can’t do it; Manu can’t do it; Green, while a wonderful defender and quite good at guarding point guards, can’t do it. Something I saw in the second half gave me a little hope looking forward, though: Cory Joseph had a nice little edge guarding Westbrook. He still couldn’t stop him, per se; but he accepted the challenge and competed hard on both ends against Westbrook. He’s definitely the team’s best option against him.

Which gets to what is perhaps most troubling against the Thunder: our best line-ups and player match-ups all come from the bench. The starters were really ineffectual. Parker couldn’t contain Westbrook and didn’t get much going on offense. Duncan played his ass off, but got overwhelmed by Adams on both ends of the floor. Green had a rough night. Marco had his moments (see above dunk), but mostly was invisible. Tiago played well, but only with the second unit.

All of our best play came from the bench. Manu (his great play helps to support my 2-days off theory), Cory, Bonner, Baynes, and Tiago all had really solid games. The best run came with Manu, Cory, Tiago, and Danny on the floor (again, Danny only showed well with the second unit, like Tiago) when the Spurs were the better team and took a brief lead. But a game can’t be won in two 8 minute stints with second units squaring off. Somehow, the Spurs have to get production from the starting unit.

And contain Westbrook.

Oh, and contend with Durant when he comes back.

Kawhi will clearly help. Mills will help, with his shooting. Boris can help (he sat out with a fever). But the fact remains that the Thunder are the toughest match-up for the Spurs in the NBA.

If both teams remain in the bottom half of the playoff picture, it’s going to make for some interesting first round match-ups. The teams near the top aren’t going to want to face the Spurs or the Thunder in the first round. What a reward for a strong season.

And one good thing about the Spurs early season struggles: they might avoid OKC in the first round.

The season only pauses for a moment on Christmas. The Spurs start another brutal stretch of games, heading to New Orleans for a Friday night game.