OKC Thunder's Defensive Floor Decreased in December

For the entire season up to the month of December, the Oklahoma City Thunder had dominated the league in terms of defensive efficiency.

Shutting down offenses has been the team's bread and butter this season, similar to how it made its deep playoff run and claiming its eventual NBA title a year ago. Teams had been unsettled going up against this team, especially when adding new depth with the emergence of Ajay Mitchell who has been exceptional as a second-year player.

Of course, along with guys like Chet Holmgren, Cason Wallace, Alex Caruso, Lu Dort, among others, the perimeter defense fielded by Oklahoma City led it to mounting the best defensive rating in the league.

But in the month of December, the defense hasn't shown to be quite as formidable. With three losses to the San Antonio Spurs and a loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves, the Thunder's defensive reign has been calmed a bit. The Spurs shot 54% from the field or better in two of its wins over OKC, with its worst outing in its two-point win over Oklahoma City in the first meeting coming off a 41% shooting performance.

That's also been reflected in the amount of points this team has given up as a whole this month. Oklahoma City's now slipped to second in the league in defensive rating, allowing 106.9 points per game—bringing them in the mix with many other teams in the top five, something this team hasn't seen at all this year.

The team's been so dominant that it has been head and heels above every other team in this category. Subsequently, it's led to the team's point differential suffering as well, going from a plus-17.9 differential in November—easily first in the NBA—to a plus-10.7 differential in December, now second in the NBA behind the Boston Celtics.

These metrics are still incredibly efficient, especially when realizing that, even with these drops, the Thunder still lead the league in these categories for the entire season. And of course, it still leads the Western Conference with a 26-5 record.

But it's important for this team to have this reality check at this point in the season—the team and its players are not indestructible, and they're certainly aware of that.

The defensive floor has been decreased with how San Antonio has been able to penetrate this Oklahoma City defense, but it's still higher than any other teams' floor in the association.