Game 65 Pregame Primer, part 2: Thunder (40-24) vs. Jazz (42-23)
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ESPN preview
Tip-off:
2:30pm @ The Arena, ? ESPN
Projected starting lineups:
| Oklahoma City | Utah |
| PG: Chris Paul | PG: Mike Conley |
| SG: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander | SG: Donovan Mitchell |
| SF: Lu Dort | SF: Joe Ingles |
| PF: Danilo Gallinari | PF: Royce O’Neale |
| C: Steven Adams | C: Rudy Gobert |
3 Big Things:
- Midrange Shooting: Rudy Gobert is a menace in the paint, with or without coronavirus. It will be a real task to get to the rim with him lurking, so the Thunder will have to rely heavily on midrange shooting, specifically out of the pick and roll. Luckily for us, our three headed monster at point guard all excel at that spot on the floor.
- Fool’s gold? The young guys really came to play in Orlando. From Lu Dort’s improves shooting and playmaking, Darius Bazley’s confidence, Nader’s shooting, and Hamidou Diallo’s ability to just go 100 times harder than anyone out there. BUT, that was in a scrimmage atmosphere. Can these young guns keep firing on all cylinders when it actually matters?
- The longest game ever played: This game started March 11th, 2020 and will end August 1st, 2020. It’s been a long wait, hopefully it’s all worth it!
Memory Lane
For kicks, you can re-read the first time we previewed this game back in March. Some of the breakdown still holds up for the contest nearly five months later (seeding tiebreakers), some of it is laughably moot (the Thunder getting some extra rest down the stretch), and a joke about home court advantage turned out to be depressingly prescient.
Follow along on Twitter with Daily Thunder, run today by DT senior writer, Olivia Panchal.
