OKC Thunder Must Take its Identity Back to Get First Win Over San Antonio Tuesday Night

The Oklahoma City Thunder sits at a record of 33-7 so far this season. Amassing these amount of wins in such a short span of time hasn't been easy, but it's still provided the team with the top record in the NBA while of course leading the Western Conference.

The team behind Oklahoma City in the West is the one team who has consistently given the Thunder issues—the surging San Antonio Spurs who hold a 27-12 record with one of the youngest and most brightest cores alongside OKC across the league. This season, the Spurs have had the Thunder's number, and it's been put on national display to this point.

Victor Wembanyama and his guys have called out Oklahoma City three times to zero in those two teams' season series up to this point. On Tuesday night, that could potentially be lifted to four total wins across four games without quite yet crossing the midway point of the season. OKC and San Antonio are slated to meet for one more time following Tuesday night's game, totalling five meetings on the year.

For Oklahoma City, its frankly struggled against this team. The first game was close with the Spurs edging the Thunder out by just two points, but the next two caught Oklahoma City up with 20-point and 15-point victories.

A commonality throughout these teams' meetings thus far has been the Thunder being thrown off its game and shifted off the line of its own identity—that identity being stable, suffocating perimeter defense with the capability of generating 20-plus points off turnovers in each game as the team runs the floor.

It's how Oklahoma City made a name for itself and went on to win an NBA title a year ago, and that was the case to start out its incredibly hot start to the season.

But with the Spurs seeming to have figured this team out, the Thunder has struggled to find that same formula since.

In their first meeting on a neutral site, Oklahoma City still won the turnover battle after forcing the Spurs to cough the ball up 25 times, but the Thunder also gave up more points off turnovers than San Antonio did with 26. And in a neck-and-neck game that could've gone either way, that ended up mattering greatly with the Spurs coming out on top by two.

The following meeting in San Antonio, a 20-point routing for the Spurs saw them dominate in this area. Only committing nine turnovers to the Thunder's 15 and causing 20 points off turnovers as a result.

The most recent meeting, a 15-point win by San Antonio, seemed to be the only outlier as Oklahoma City just sparingly won the turnover battle. Still, the Thunder had been accustomed to more defensively-dominating performances to this point; forcing 13 turnovers which resulted in 13 points.

All this to say, the Thunder needs to take its identity back from the Spurs on Tuesday night in front of its home crowd on national television if it wants to send a message.

The defending champions. The best record in the league. Arguably the best player in the league and reigning MVP in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. Oklahoma City needs to step up in this one to prove it to its fans, audience, and most importantly, the players themselves.