After a good defensive effort in Philadelphia last night, the Oklahoma City Thunder look to add to their second half season victories tonight against the Orlando Magic. In my opinion sitting at 5th in the east which is around where they usually are every season, the Magic aren't that good of a team. I still stand by my opinion saying Andrew Bynum is the better center between him or Dwight. Dwight Howard is averaging 19.9 PPG, 15.2 RPG, and 2.28 blocks per game. Dwight is going to get his points and his rebounds, there shouldn't be a doubt about that. If the OKC Thunder can contain Ryan Anderson and Jason Richardson's three point shooting, then this game should be an easy win for the OKC Thunder although OKC is winless in their last 7 in Orlando. Rebounding and turnovers are also key here. Kevin Durant is on a mission, and he's playing like it. The Orlando Magic are going to have a tough time defending him as they're going to have to rely on Hedo Turkoglu (who isn't the best one on one defender) and Jason Richardson to try to contain the Durantula. Along with having to contain KD, there's Russell Westbrook and James Harden. Jameer Nelson is going to have his hands full tonight, and if the Magic decide to put Jason Richardson on Kevin Durant then James Harden is going to get his opportunities tonight (not that he doesn't every night) against the Magic. I see too many opportunities here for the OKC Thunder to score, and other than Dwight I don't see much of a threat in the match ups in favor for the Magic. I think the OKC Thunder continue their second half of the season tonight with a win, and the less prominent Big 3 in the league (Westbrook, Harden and Durant) all have solid games.
Result: Watching the pregame show before the game, I heard Charles Barkley say this is a bad match up for Oklahoma City because Ryan Anderson is going to force Ibaka out of the paint in order to guard the 3. Chuck also mentioned that Kendrick Perkins will get into early foul trouble guarding Dwight and that Ibaka would then have to guard him. I already knew this, but I did not think that it was a mismatch for the Thunder, nor would Kendrick have early foul trouble. It was a back and forth game early in the 1st half until about the 4 minute mark where Orlando went up by 9. Being that OKC has two top scorers and James Harden for when the ammo runs out, 9 points isn't a big deficit to worry about with the Thunder and by half they were only down by 3. At around the 4 minute mark in the 3rd, Orlando went up by 14 (74-60) which for even the Thunder is a big deficit to come back from and the 3rd ended with a 3 point lead in favor for Orlando. Although OKC's "big 3" isn't made by today's traditional standards of demands and high salaries, Harden, Westbrook and Durant took control of their team as any of the other big 3 trio's would and overcome the deficit at the 3 minute mark of the 4th. Kevin Durant scored 38 points with 8 boards, James Harden scored 13, had 5 boards and 5 assists and Russy Westbrook had a double double with 29 points and 10 assists. I expected Orlando's guards to have trouble against Harden and Westbrook, and Durant is a machine on his own and was too much for Turkoglu to handle. OKC as a team shot 44.4% from the field against Orlando's 36% 3 point shooting going 9/25 from the field, which is what Orlando needed to beat the Thunder. Ryan Anderson had 15 going 3/7 from distance, and Dwight Howard 33 points and 9 boards. The key here for the Thunder was to control the 3 point shooting, let Dwight get his and for the Thunder big 3 to do work. The final score was 105-102 for the Thunder who are off to a good start in the 2nd half of the season.
8-3
No comments:
Post a Comment