vs.
New Orleans Hornets (32-32, 11-21 road) vs. Okla. City Thunder (38-24, 19-11 home)
TV: KSBI (Cox 15, HD 715)
Stream: Click here
Radio: WWLS The Sports Animal (98.1 FM, 640 AM, 97.1 FM Tulsa)
Time: 7:00 CST
Offensive Rating: Thunder – 106.6 (17th), Hornets – 107.1 (13th)
Defensive Rating: Thunder – 103.1 (6th), Hornets – 109.0 (19th)
Pace: Thunder – 92.9 (14th), Hornets – 92.5 (16th)
View from the enemy: Hornets 24/7
The Hornets are here blah blah blah the past blah blah 2005 blah. All that is pretty much out of my system now. I don’t really give two poos about Chris Paul and David West anymore. They are the enemy and this is a big game. The Thunder can pretty much bury New Orleans from harming their playoff chances with a win tonight. Oklahoma City would own the tiebreaker over the Hornets and plus, it’s one more game up on them with one less game to go.
New Orleans coming in: The Hornets have lost four of five, but most recently won Monday night against Golden State at home. But on the road, NOLA is just 11-21. And in their last 10, they’re 4-6.
THE MATCHUPS
It’s no secret anymore that the NOLA offense is completely point guard controlled. Darren Collison is doing a fairly excellent job in filling in for Chris Paul, or about as good as you’d hope your rookie backup would do. He’s basically doing it by doing the same things. Taking his time, getting in the lane and finding a cutter or an open shooter. Basically it’s pass, pass, pass for Collison and it’s working well. He’s got guys he can lob to in Julian Wright and Emeka Okafor. He’s got shooters he can kick to in Peja and James Posey. And he’s got midrange guys like David West, Morris Peterson and Marcus Thornton. It’s a pretty well-oiled machine for the Hornets. At least offensively.
Russell Westbrook played extremely well against Collison the last meeting, but that was when Collison was just settling into his new spot. He’s playing much better now so this will be a good matchup. Thabo will move over and play Collison some, but with new X-Factor Marcus Thornton scoring the ball well, Thabo will have to give attention there as well. The thing about Collison is that while he can pile up assists, he can also catch the turnover bug. So with OKC’s hawking, pressure defense, I think this could be a good thing for the Thunder.
Peja can’t guard Kevin Durant, but Posey did a solid job at the Ford Center back in January. David West typically abuses Jeff Green, Okafor is a load inside for Nenad Krstic and even without Paul, the scorers get their chances for NOLA. But what hurts the Hornets is the lack of a really productive bench, which is something OKC has on them. A good night from Serge Ibaka - who will probably see a lot of time on Okafor, as he did in the first two meetings – solid minutes from Nick Collison and some offense from James Harden should do the trick.
(UPDATE: Peja is out tonight. Julian Wright will start in his steed.)
Now isn’t the time to start dropping home games, especially the important variety. The Hornets edged OKC last time in the Ford Center when the Thunder scored like four points in the fourth quarter. It was an ugly finish to a really exciting game. There can’t be any of that tonight. The Thunder hasn’t played great defense the last week or so, so now would be a good time to get back to that. Keeping pace in the West for seeding is important, but snuffing out any potential playoff spoilers is still the priority.
Tip at 7:00 CST. Go Hometown Thunder.
Um... Beside the begining of the first quater (JG could do better), Thunder was playing really good... Really good... :)
It's nippicking but, man... They really need to keep working on their 3 pts shots... Beside KD's 2 out 3 three points shots, nobody else even made one. Hopefully it's only a one night thing, but that's something the Thunder is really lacking.
We're giving up an average of 25 pts in the 1st and 2nd quarters, but only 22 to 22.5 in the 3rd and 4th quarters.
Hah. Even Durant knows about Krstic being better in the 3rd quarter.
That was a really nice defensive performance.
DJ White is basically unstoppable.
@Craig
Who else do we have to play SF, esp. with Harden out?
After tonight's win and what I assume will be a win next game vs. the Nets, we would only have to go 10-8 the rest of the season to have a 50 win year
Wow! If you would've told me before the season we were about to win 50 games I would have poured hot fish grease in your face and slapped you across the face with a frying pan for insulting my intelligence
Of course, this will add a loss to our vs. sub-.500 team record since we are 2-1 against N.O.
Why is green still out there?
DJ's in!
White!
DJ WHITE
Is it wrong to want Westbrook to stay in until he gets the triple-double?
I guess the defense has shown up in the second half, wow.
@Dylan
It was only a matter of time before his sexy went from being a gift to a curse
Anyone else getting tired of players yelling "and 1" when they think they are fouled? Especially when the shot isn't even close to going in? It's almost as bad as shrieking in women's tennis...
He shoots it well but I'm talking about when he's near the rim.. he likes to fade away or shoot a hook shot or something. He should dunk or go up strong to get contact. Maybe show him some Amare film.
@justin
Serge should take that 15 footer more often, he definitely has it.
@The Don
too much sexy
S***!!!!! why was harden escorted into the locker room by the medical staff????
Why did Harden leave?
I love 24 second violation. I wish we could force them every single time.
Boston is getting slaughtered by Memphis and Dallas losing to the Nets at halftime at home.
So Memphis is up 26 at Boston. Does this make our game there more winable?
The mistakes make you cringe sometimes but man Ibaka is looking good lately.. I wish he'd finish strong more often.
Hornets look like they hate to play basketball. No emotions at all.
Brian Davis you suck!
or the reason is he is Al Thornton's cousin.
Jeff Green has really good hands.
Kev :
I watch very little college basketball . . . someone tell me why Thornton slipped to the second round . . .
I still find that inexplicable, but it's probably because he's a high volume scorer who isn't that athletic and starred on a ridiculously bad SEC year (and LSU didn't even go to the NCAA on that awful conference).
In my opinion, the guy can play and that was obvious since his LSU days, but almost every GM passed on DeJuan Blair, so it's not that shocking lol.
This is getting heartless my brotha.... Seriously!!!
That pass from Westbrook to Green for the fastbreak looked sooooo awesome.
My gawd brian davis is so cheesy
Man i hate it when westbrook forces his shots. He should pass it more IMO.
Ibaka will be back in in about 3 minutes to shut West down again. It's predictable.
KD isolated on the wing being covered by okafor and begging for the ball yet russ just ignores him
Which is why I switched from Okafor to Dalembert, who's playing as well as Okafor but only has one more year on his deal..
I've cooled off some on Okafor I guess. He is top ten in both OREB% and DREB%, and he's a good shot blocker. I was hoping his offensive game would come out more on the Hornets but it hasn't really happened.
I don't think it's the price of Okafor that puts people off, it's the length of the contract. If he only had 2-3 years left I'd probably still advocate him. But it's too much guaranteed money, even though he'd seriously help this team IMO.
@Osano-Whoa
Gotta love Westbrook goin' out and gettin' his. He's been so assertive these last couple games. We definitely need that out of him.
Thabo with great defense, is there any better defender in the league at his position?
very good defensive score +22 at the half . . .
The fronts would work if we had a legitimate weak side help that can challenge shots without fouling so much.
It's a lot more than $10 million, BTW.
justin :Okafor hasn’t played well against us but he’s generally pretty good and solid.
I wouldnt pay $10 mil per for "solid" . . .
That bankshot from Westbrook was crazy.
Green . . . wow . . .
Okafor hasn't played well against us but he's generally pretty good and solid.
fronting defense - awesomne . . .
That pass was so beautiful.
you know your spoiled when it sucks to watch a game not broadcasted in HD