(This story was updated with new information.)
SAN ANTONIO — Listen closely.
Beneath the ecstatic screams of those inside San Antonio’s Frost Bank Center. Between Jalen Williams’ exhausted grunts, forced to play center for another game. Before the Thunder finally came alive, too little too late in a 110-104 loss to the Spurs on Tuesday night.
There was a faint beep: The heart monitor of OKC’s offense held just a slight pulse. Just enough to hang around, but far from enough to survive.
Its survival kit in Smallville is limited. But it’s mostly been the same for the week that OKC has been stranded on this island without centers: Pressure the ball and feast on the results.
The 21 turnovers the Thunder forced might confuse some with Tuesday’s result. But seven of those came in the fourth quarter, too late to shave what was a 21-point deficit with 10 minutes to play.
“Just playing harder,” Williams said of what needed to change. “That’s really it. Holding each other accountable the whole game. … I think how we end the game is how we’d like to start the game.”
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Without a complete roster this season, the Thunder has faced questions about its offense. In the week without Chet Holmgren, it’s hardly had the personnel to deflect those questions. Or shots, really.
Just lackadaisical passes. Weak handles. The things OKC’s mischievous group of remaining guards and wings can actually impact. There’s no other formula for the times.
“It’s been this way for however many games Chet has been out,” Alex Caruso said, returning Tuesday after missing three games this past week. “The times we do it well, we play well. The times we don’t, other teams take advantage of it.”
San Antonio’s defense, without Victor Wembanyama, Devin Vassell or Jeremy Sochan, tightened its help. Gilgeous-Alexander (32 points, seven assists) was the Thunder offense’s lifeline. When it gasped and struggled to make just 16 of its season-high 53 3-point attempts, SGA had solutions. Timely catch-and-shoot 3s, signature midrange pull-ups. His efficiency stood alone.
The Thunder, still unfamiliar with free throws, struggled with inside advantages. And the outside results were brutal.
Jalen Williams, who finished with 27 points and 10 rebounds on a career-high 26 shots, missed all six of his outside attempts. He was a minus-17, left to lead offense inside lineups that still yearn for a credentialed center.
Alex Caruso had the chance to make Tuesday’s ending even more interesting. He went 0 for 5 from deep, including the shot inside the game’s final seconds. He moved to 7 for 32 from deep on the season.
There was Dort, who’s been perhaps OKC’s most timely shooter this season but delivered an untimely 2-for-12 performance on Tuesday.
Adam Flagler, meant to supplement sharpshooter Isaiah Joe’s absence, went 1 for 8 from the field (1 for 7 from deep).
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On the other end, OKC seemingly forgot how it has to muster offense in these times. Its rotations were slow, it played with fire as Chris Paul made entry passes, and it watched the veteran Spurs guard activate a team of young, hungry individuals.
“Nobody’s offense is perfect in the NBA, and ours is still far from that,” Williams said. “But I think a lot of our issues arise when we’re not playing defense and being scrappy.”
Gilgeous-Alexander’s whole life, as he’ll tell you, is consistent. So he’ll tell you on nights like Tuesday that the Thunder — a team, when healthy, with more creative possibilities than Pablo Picasso with an iPad — can’t depend on makes or misses. He said the same a year ago, on the best 3-point shooting team in the league.
This season, so far, has tested his words. His psyche. Since Game 1, his squad has missed Isaiah Hartenstein, a center that was meant to change the way SGA could play. Meant to give him a bruising screener and new pockets of parquet to play. Since two Sundays ago, he’s missed Holmgren, who he knows makes defenses paranoid.
The thing that theoretically shouldn’t change is the team’s intended intensity and defensive capabilities, even as its forces are shaved down. Pressure the ball, gallop in transition and hope to make teams forget about the early shot-making returns and lack of players taller than 6-foot-8.
Is that sustainable, though?
“Absolutely,” Gilgeous-Alexander said. “The teams that win, win because they’re really good defensively. That’s what we want to do: We want to win. So if we want to win, we better sustain it for 82 games and then some.”
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Keldon Johnson, roster of “hungry guys” take advantage
Aaron Wiggins came face-to-face with what it looked like to be drunk with confidence.
He closed out like Buddy Hield had broken free from his grasp. It was only Keldon Johnson. And yet, Johnson, with two minutes to play in the first half, was already 4 for 5 from 3.
Stepbacks, sidesteps. Johnson was playing out of his mind. He threatened to breach that threshold when a role player is too far gone to contain. Little did Wiggins know: Johnson was already there.
When he floated past Wiggins and above Gilgeous-Alexander’s head for an emphatic slam, that was clear.
Johnson entered Tuesday with efficiency that would be the worst of his career if it held up for 82 games: 44.1% shooting from the field and 25.5% from 3 through 14 games.
But he was the catalyst for the second-quarter run that kept OKC looking upward Tuesday night.
“It’s just slow,” Williams said of OKC’s first half. “Bad defense to start, and then everybody’s comfortable. … That roster that we just played has a lot of hungry guys that are trying to make a name for themselves. Trying to get into their rotation.”
Johnson, now in his sixth season, has been around a bit too long to fit the exact parameters of what Williams described. But Johnson’s hunger, on a night without several Spurs starters, spread.
San Antonio’s centers Zach Collins and Charles Bassey aren’t exactly the image of bludgeoning bigs. OKC had already downed more frightening giants on similarly depleted teams over the past week. But their presence meant open looks for the Spurs’ outside shooters, who had a night unlike most this season.
The Spurs had seven double-digit scorers. They made 41.3% of their 46 3-point attempts. Johnson pitched in six of those. Improbable, timely — no matter. Johnson was overly confident Tuesday night, and OKC happened to be reacquainted with what an appetite looks like.
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