Stiles Points: OKC Thunder Can Recreate Style of Play In Postseason
As the Oklahoma City Thunder (47-20) sit atop the Western Conference all eyes are on the NBA postseason. Despite still having 15 games to play in the regular season, it is only normal to wonder how far this Thunder team can go in the NBA Playoffs.
From their rebounding and size issues to inexperience from top to bottom, how will the Thunder's stellar regular season translate to the postseason?
The Thunder dominate in transition, force turnovers at an unbelievable clip and push the pace to counter their lack of size. Traditionally, the game slows down in the NBA Playoffs. As it becomes a more half-court style of play there are fewer turnovers and less fast break points as a result.
That is something OKC typically uses to spark themselves both offensively and shift the momentum to their side at home going on avalanche runs to the tune of a 27-7 record inside the Paycom Center.
While the Thunder are turning in 1.146 points per possession in transition, they have also found success in the half-court ranking in the 97th percentile in the half-court producing 1.072 points per possession.
Oklahoma City can keep pace in the half-court often utilizing second and third actions to keep defenses on their heels and earn a crease to go score. With Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams as go-to bucket-getters logging even more minutes in the postseason and Chet Holmgren's timely shot-making, there should be little concern about the Thunder on that end of the floor.
However, what does the defense look like when you stripe away steals and teams are no longer giving away possessions with a lackadaisical attitude that is commonly found in the regular season?
While the raw turnover numbers and fast break points might shrink, the Thunder will still possess a ton of versatility and length allowing them to play the passing lanes and switch everything earning deflection and deflection to fluster a half-court offense.
With one or two deflections in a possession, it really bogs things down and increases the likelihood of the opposition taking bad shots playing into the hand of the Thunder's defense.
With recreating the advantages turnovers give OKC, they have also been able to flash artificial transition points this season pushing the ball up the floor on a made basket before pitching it back to Holmgren for a trailing triple.
The Thunder's style of play projects to translate to the NBA postseason even if it is not a direct carbon copy.
Stiles Points
- Gilgeous-Alexander, Holmgren, Giddey and Jaylin Williams were in attendance at Drake and J. Cole's Concert inside the Paycom Center.
- Gilgeous-Alexander was nominated for the Western Conference Player of the Week Award on Monday as Houston's Jalen Green took home the honor.
- LeBron James and JJ Redick have launched a basketball podcast focused on the X's and O's of the game and thinking at a deeper level. Mind Games dropped on Tuesday where James gave heavy praise to Oklahoma City complimenting how good they are are drafting.
- Anthony Edwards' highlight dunk over John Collins helped the Timberwolves pull off a win over the Jazz on Monday moving them into second place in the Western Conference. The Thunder, who welcome the Jazz in on Wednesday, still cling to a half-game lead atop the Western Conference.
- On the second night of a back-to-back the Wolves take on the Denver Nuggets in a game that will be crucial in the Western Conference standings.
Song of the Day: A Change is Gonna Come by Greta Van Fleet.
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