OKC Thunder Dominate With Scorching Hot Shooting in Utah

Oklahoma City is proving it might not have any weaknesses this season.

On Friday night, the Thunder secured a dominant 144-112 victory against the Utah Jazz in their second NBA Cup game to further take control of the race for the top spot in the West. Despite the Thunder trailing by as much as 18 in the first half, they always seemed in control en route to a 50-point turnaround.

After a slow start from beyond the arc this season, the Thunder had begun to round into form from outside, and that was as clear as ever on Friday. While the Thunder’s absurd defense deservedly stole the headlines for holding the Jazz without a field goal for over half of the third quarter, their 3-point shooting was unstoppable all night.

Against the Jazz, the Thunder shot 23-of-37 from deep, their most makes in a game this season. While their 62.2% mark from beyond the arc will be nearly impossible to replicate this season, it was the fourth time in the past six games the Thunder had nailed at least 40% of their threes.

Although the Thunder are unlikely to nail nearly two-thirds of their threes again this season, their outside shooting display once again showed just how dangerous they can be when shots are falling. While the Thunder have shown again and again that they can grind out tight games with their defense when shots aren’t falling, they’ve also shown that they are virtually unbeatable when those shots are going down.

After Friday night’s action, the Thunder are up to 18th in 3-point shooting after spending most of the first couple of weeks at the bottom of the league. Sure, the Thunder still have some room to grow to get where they want to be in that category, but they’ve clearly proven that they have the ability to nail a plethora of threes on any given night.

Perhaps most importantly for the Thunder, they're getting those contributions from deep from just about everywhere. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander went 3-of-3, Jaylin Williams nailed a career-best five threes and Lu Dort continued his bounce-back from deep, nailing 3-of-4.

It won’t be easy for the Thunder to keep up their hot shooting, but knowing they’re capable of outbursts like this from beyond the arc might be enough to scare the rest of the league even more. After not being able to hit from outside to start the year, the Thunder might have solved their lone weakness as they’ve streaked to 16-1.