The Oklahoma City Thunder beat the San Antonio Spurs 106-97 but the score didn’t reflect the game at all. Before tip-off Coach Scott Brooks replaced Thabo Sefalosha with Reggie Jackson and slid Russell Westbrook to SG, and Serge Ibaka who was updated to day-to-day Thursday afternoon was inserted back into the lineup. It was obvious OKC was making one last desperate attempt to change things up and win a game by as an injured Ibaka played at less than 100%, but who really knows how hurt he was in the first place. (SIA Injury Profile)
Once the game started the arena was electric and Ibaka’s presence was made early as hit he four jumpers early and helped to shut down Tony Parker, who had a horrible night. Tim Duncan also struggled as Ibaka contested and blocked multiple Duncan shots. As I said before this series began, Ibaka is San Antonio’s kryptonite. San Antonio looked so dysfunctional and struggled all night, if not for a offensive explosion from Manu Ginobili, the Spurs might have got beat by 25. Coach Gregg Popovich took out his starters early and inserted the second unit for most of the 4th quarter as San Antonio raised the white flag early.
San Antonio got beat on the glass 52-36 and you can say Ibaka’s presence had a huge impact on that stat. In the previous two games San Antonio won the boards by a combined 93-75. Ibaka finished the night with 15 points, 7 rebounds, and 4 blocks. The rest of the crew did business as usual as Westbrook put in 26 points, 8 rebounds, and 7 assists. The MVP Kevin Durant also put in 25 points and 10 rebounds.
After the game San Antonio addressed that they understood there was a great chance that Ibaka would make his way back into the lineup and they prepared for that (sure didn’t look like they did) . Coach Popovich added after the game, “I was very disappointed that we didn’t come out with more of a foot in the neck sort of attitude.” He also stated, “They also killed us on the boards, they beat us in 50/50 balls and that’s very disappointing to me.”
Thunder coach Brooks said after the game, “I knew we were better than losing by 30, It was not us but it was us that night, But were a much better team than that. I have a lot of respect for San Antonio, but there not that much better than us.”
The series obviously will be looked at with a different lenses now that OKC won a game. This is now the series will all thought it would be. Oklahoma City was a shell of themselves in the first two games without Ibaka, now that he is back in the lineups the Thunder look like a team that can make this a long series. If Oklahoma City can win game 4 we might just be seeing flashes of the 2012 Western Final. However, as of now San Antonio is still in the driver’s seat. Thy have made it their mission to go back to the finals and beat Miami and we’ll have to see if OKC has enough to get in the way of that plan.
Ultimately I still think San Antonio will still close out this series in 6 games and go back to the NBA Finals and match up with the Miami Heat for a rematch for the ages.
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