Thunder Cracks Clippers

In the final game of the regular season the Oklahoma City Thunder (22-50) were able to defeat the Los Angeles Clippers last night (47-25) 117-112 at Chesapeake Energy Arena. It seemed that this game was not important enough to win for the Clippers. They sat out most of their starters, again. Ivica Zubac only played 6 seconds, so him starting shouldn’t even really count. This season has been a struggle for the Thunder so they were trying their damnedest to get the win from start to finish. Despite it being basically 48 minutes of garbage time, it was another close one throughout. It was actually more fun to watch than the previous game in that the Clippers who did play didn’t seem to be checked out.

They actually had a 2 point lead with 2 minutes to go. But after an overturned turnover call on the Thunder, OKC was able snatch the lead back. They did it with some made free throws, a 3 pointer, and a dunk to seal it. Ty Lue did not even call any timeouts in the waning seconds. So, they seemed to be content with whatever outcome. The Clippers are now set for a first round rematch with the Dallas Mavericks in the playoffs.

STAR OF THE GAME

Aleksej Pokusevski and his 29 points on 10 out of 19 shooting, 8 rebounds, and 2 assists. This guy looked a whole lot better than when his team faced the Clippers in previous matchups. This guy may be 7 feet tall but he doesn’t look like he ways weighs more than 100 lbs. He looks like a toothpick out there, and would get pushed around accordingly. Last night the Thunder would not have won without Slenderman as it was him who was making big shot after big shot, going 6 for 9 from behind the 3 point line. He even made a big time go ahead 3 at the end of the game.

BIGGEST CONCERN

Having to face the Dallas Mavericks once again in the first round. The Clippers barely defeated the Mav’s last year in the first round, and lost the regular season series against them this year. One of those losses was a 50 point one for the worst L in franchise history. The Mavericks very well would have beat the Clippers last year in the playoffs if Kristaps Porzingis had not have gotten injured. The Mav’s are a bad matchup for the Clips and I am not looking forward to it. I wish the Clips would’ve tried harder to win these past 2 games so they would be facing the Blazers instead.

SURPRISE CONTRIBUTION

Moses Brown and his 24 points, 18 rebounds, 2 assists, and 7 blocks. I was not familiar with pretty much any of the starting lineup for the Thunder last night, so any contribution by any of them would have come as surprise to me. This guy though had a stat line that absolutely jumped off the page. He had nearly a 20-20 triple double game. He was a forced to be reckoned with down low as he was blocking shots at the rim left and right and gobbling up every available rebound to be had. This was a garbage game though, so we’ll see if those numbers were hollow come next year.

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