vs. 
OKC Thunder (8-1, 3-1 road) vs. San Antonio Spurs (8-0, home)
TV: TNT (Cox 31, HD 730)
Stream: Click here
Radio: WWLS The Sports Animal (98.1 FM, 640 AM, 97.1 FM Tulsa)
Time: 7:30 CT
Series tied 0-0
View from the enemy: 48 Minutes of Hell
SAN ANTONIO — This trip just feels different. Last season’s journey to the Western Conference Finals had a significant happy-to-be-here feeling to it. Or really more like a oh-holy-crap-can-you-believe-this feeling. This time around, there’s no shock. No surprise. No pausing to try and soak it in. This is now about business, about four wins and advancing on toward the ultimate prize.
I’m not really a believer in fate or basketball gods, but I do think about storylines. Sometimes, it seems like the setup is just too perfect. You could have old (Spurs) vs. old (Celtics) in the lockout condensed season where old was supposed to fail. You could have LeBron vs. KD. You could have Perk vs. his old team. Or you could have the old school (Spurs) vs. the empire builders (Heat). Which one sounds best? Which one sounds like it’s been written in the stars? These are the things I think about when I have a week to stew over a series. I can’t be the only one.
But enough of that crap. You can talk about goals, motivations and whatever else ad nauseam. It’s time to play. The Thunder appear more ready for this moment than ever. Whether they’re good enough is the question.
Tip at 7:30 CT. Go Thunder Go.
http://www.dailythunder.com/2012/05/thunder-miss-a-big-opportunity-dropping-game-1-101-98/#respond
i fell like i'm reliving a nightmare that is the 2011 western conference finals...
feel*
@bmuelle21
Didn't we lose games 1, 3, and 6 to Memphis in the conference semi-finals last year and still win the series? Like Pop told his players: no one said this was going to be easy.
@ThunderChick2010 @bmuelle21 This series won't go 7, if OKC is gonna win, it needs to be in 6 and won in OKC.
@thunder_fan_in_korea @bmuelle21
I take my insightful comments where I can get them. :)
@ThunderChick2010 @bmuelle21 err, if you are saying okc can beat the spurs should you really be quoting insightful comments by greg popovich?
@ThunderChick2010 @bmuelle21 yep
@bmuelle21
I felt like that Dallas team was better and we were fighting. I felt like we are just flat out better than this team. (Although the officiating in both game 1's were atrocius and it was the same crew)
@FF_pickups @bmuelle21
Hell no, that Dallas team wasn't better, Just Dirk went completely ham on everyone.
Why is everybody always picking on me?
It's not like you've ever coached against a genius :(
#PopHasMyNumber
Brooks did a excellent job in terms of game-planning - but his in-game adjustments were crap.
@courtsense playing perkins with the 5 fouls was beyond idiotic
@courtsense I agree. When they started the 4th quarter layup line we should have had Ibaka in.
At the very least due to the fact that Perkins seemed slow on his rotations.
@courtsense subs was horrible that was all
OkC has Conference Finals-level talent and can be reasonably expected to get at least that far in a typical season.
But if they get there and then can't get any further, to me that's on the Coach.
You've got to question the NBA when Crawford is the game one official for a San Antonio game. The NBA should be looking to avoid even the implication of impropriety. Obviously, they don't care about that implication.
@FF_pickups Keep in mind that from a TV ratings perspective, the NBA would much, much, rather have an exciting, explosive young team like us than the boring methodic, geriatric Spurs in the finals.
@jamisonjohn
I don't know if that's true or not. We are a WAY WAY smaller market and the vote on ESPN.com, more people said they were rooting for the Spurs.
@jamisonjohn
Yeah, no, our market is nowhere near their market. San Antonio by itself is 37th. Then you factor in the Austin market and a fraction of the Houston market, our market is nowhere near that of San Antonio.
@FF_pickups ESPN polls are hardly an accurate measure as 60% of the people who vote are fans of teams that are playing. And we're not that much smaller of a market than they are. Visually, it's pretty clear - we're far more exciting than the Spurs.
@FF_pickups I still can't believe they didn't review Fisher's should-a-been-3. I think that's the first time in years I've watched a game where that wasn't atleast looked at. That'd be like 200+ games atleast.
@alvarex
I told my wife the same thing. I've watched easily 80 NBA games this year and don't remember that happening one time. Again, it doesn't matter but it makes me want to not watch the NBA anymore.
Some gamblers crapped on that last trey by Harden as the line was 5 1/2 tonight. Russ and James have to play much better--simple as that. If some of you want to can Brooks before OKC gets to play a home game in this series--the interim coach will still need Russ and James to play much better in the fourth period..sigh.
@El Prez
So were the steaks and cigars good at least?
@ThunderChick2010 We had a great watch party. It was a good basketball game. We had a chance--we didn't close, but I didn't see anyone not playing hard. Steaks, beer, wine, turtle pie, and cigars were excellent. I'm going to sleep like a baby tonight. I expect both Russ and James to execute at a much higher level on Tuesday. Joey Crawford had nothing to do with James just being awful. I mean--you have to call it like it is. We stuck on 73 points for what seemed like an eternity. We talked about this earlier in the week...you can't have six minutes of offensive hell against the Spurs---you have to score with them. James and Russ didn't do their jobs offensively. Hell--one posession it looked Kevin was playing 1 on 5 basketball in the offensive zone before that jump ball. This isn't on Brooks--this is on the two guards who didn't get it done tonight. I'm going to sleep.
@El Prez haha ik...me and this one guy compare plays and bet a lot of games and he had SA -5.5...laughed my ass off when harden made that 3
@bmuelle21 Yeah--the gamblers who took the Spurs can feel good that James pulled his head out of his ass for those last two treys. James Harden needs to compete at much, MUCH, MUCH higher level both offensively and defensively for the Thunder to have a chance
Quick stat, Thunder 1-3 in last 4 playoff games that Joey Crawford has officiated, 8-3 with any other crew.
good thing from this game is that we limited SA's 3pt shooting % to 33% much improved from the over 50% in the regular season
Blaming the refs is almost always a cop-out. You can blame the refs all you want, but you have to hand it to the Spur for going on a freakin' 30-11 run in the last 9 minutes.
@jamisonjohn The Spurs played great, no doubt. Ginobli was unstoppable.
I almost always agree that pinning any amount of blame on a loss on the refs is a cop out, but this game has that feel. It seemed like every time in the 4th quarter a defensive play was made to stop a drive a foul was called, but on the other end we couldn't draw anything unless Durant was mauled.
@alvarex I feel somewhat the same way, but the amount of influence the refs had in this loss? At most 2%. The other 98% was us shooting ourselves in the foot. That, and Brooks.
@jamisonjohn @alvarex
I think it was the refs 75%. But it doesn't matter because if the Thunder want to win, they have to overcome that bs.
@jamisonjohn
They never showed the play where they called Harden for stepping out of bounds to end the 3rd. One of the charges, the guy was clearly in the restricted area. The refs had a big hand in that come back.
@FF_pickups Refs tend to reward whichever team gets physical. The Spurs also hit their shots. To say the refs had a "big hand" in their comeback is overblown and shortsighted.
@jamisonjohn
Oh, I didn't know they shorted them a point, too. Please, help me with the list.
I know about that, that's exactly my point. The NBA doesn't care about the implication of impropriety if they are sending him to ref this game. Why don't they care about that? It's extremely eye brow raising.
@FF_pickups I hope you realize Spurs fans could easily come up with a similar list of no-calls for the Spurs. It works both ways. And I'm sure they're asking the same question about Joey Crawford. Have you seen this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOygTd1NWCM. Crawford hates Duncan.
Ultimately, it's Brooks' adjustments, as others have pointed out, and not the refs that cost us the game.
@jamisonjohn
The Spurs played a phenomenal 4th quarter, for sure. But how was the Westbrook missed Dunk not a foul? How was the Durant missed dunk not a foul? How were there 11 total free throws in the first half and 37 total in the second? Why is Joey Crawford refereeing a playoff game with the Spurs? How come Tim Duncan never got called for a moving screen (I can show you fifty of them) . Why didn't they show the Harden step out of bounds play at the end of the fourth quarter? There are a lot more that I can't think of right now.
@FF_pickups I'm frustrated by the game too, but let's not let our emotions get in the way of level-headed, rational evaluation of where things went wrong.
@jamisonjohn
lol, it doesn't matter what my opinion is anyways. My opinion is that I think that something didn't smell right. But who cares what I think anyways.
The thing that scares me the most about this game is what we chose to run at the end of the game. It reminded me of last years failure at late-game execution. Spend the first 18 seconds of the shot clock trying to force the ball to Durant, only to have him create and shoot for the last 6 seconds.
It didn't work last year, and I don't think it'll work this year.
Either let Durant bring the ball up if you're going to ISO, or run PnR with Westbrook or Harden with Durant being a baseline outlet...please....
thabo on ginobili only a few minutes at most
@Crow
Thabo was on him when he got the and one late in the fourth. I don't know the exact minutes played, though.
that was an adjustment that seems fairly obvious but didnt happen
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@MisterJohnsonOKC perkins, aldrich, cook and somebody else minor for gasol?
@Crow @MisterJohnsonOKC I dont think we get either Gasol for that. Not enough value to intrigue Memphis or LA.
@Crow @Stringer Bell @MisterJohnsonOKC
Gortat, Marc Gasol, Hibbert, Hell even Tyson Chandler can't botch a dunk that bad, or get blocked by Tony effing Parker. We know he's an upgrade compared to Kristic, thats for danm sure, but it makes you wonder how Orlando wanted to get someone who to give them somewhat of a scoring boost, or could play the SF/PF but instead they settled for J Rich and Hedo.
@Stringer Bell @MisterJohnsonOKC i was thinking lakers, who would dump about $6 million plus whatever the luxury tax would be
@tydude @Stringer Bell @MisterJohnsonOKC but is he good enough to get a title with? we will see
@Stringer Bell @Crow @MisterJohnsonOKC Perk has been good in the playoffs