Thunder Team Report – March 28th

Getting Inside

Russell Westbrook has already played in about twice as many games at last year, when the point guard led UCLA to the Final Four during the 2008 march madness. The idea that Westbrook has hit the “rookie wall,” based on his production this month, was met with resistance in Thunder circles.

Westbrook is playing two fewer minutes per game this month than in February, but his shooting percentage is up slightly to 39 percent even with a recent slump.

With Russell and shooting, it’s going to get better,” Thunder coach Scott Brooks said. “He has good form. He’s going to have to pick his spots. And this summer is going to be a big summer for all of our guys to get better. I like what he’s doing. He’s doing other things.

The dark-horse Rookie of the Year candidate continues to fill up the assist and rebounding categories on the stat sheet when he’s not scoring.

I’m better off getting my teammates involved, rebounding and doing other things,” Westbrook said. “You miss some, you make some. I’ve just got to keep being aggressive, keep taking shots.

Raptors 112, Thunder 96: Oklahoma City scored the first five points Friday night in its only trip north of the border this season, but that’s about all that went well. The Thunder (20-52) quickly fell behind after that and were routed at Toronto.

Oklahoma City shot 42 percent, with none of the starters making at least half their shots. Nick Collison was the most productive member of the Thunder, scoring 21 points on 9-of-12 shooting off the bench. Kevin Durant added 18 points.

Chris Bosh and Shawn Marion each had point-rebound double-doubles, as the Raptors won their third straight game for only the third time this season. The Thunder franchise has lost its last two games to Toronto, which leads me to believe that the sports betting world may hold a grudge, seeing how we couldn’t even hold the hefty 10 point spread we were given.

Notes

I wanted to give Chucky (Atkins) a chance to see what he has and see what kind of mix he will bring to our team,” Brooks said. “We’ve done some good things with him on the court.

Watson is set to earn $6.6 million next season, the highest on the team. Oklahoma City is likely looking for cheaper alternative to back up Russell Westbrook.

Basketball-wise, you could say we’re a young team trying to figure out who we can move forward with as an organization,” Watson said. Business-wise, it could be a different reason, a completely different angle.

• Oklahoma City has lost six of its past eight games, giving up 100.9 points during that span. The last two setbacks—Lakers and Raptors—were by a total of 34 points. Before the recent eight-game stretch, the Thunders held opponents to 90.3 points over the previous six games. Not surprisingly, they went 5-1.

• Oklahoma City is 5-34 under Scott Brooks when allowing at least 100 points, and 14-6 when holding opponents to less than 100.

We feel like we didn’t ever make a push. We didn’t string together enough stops. It was a disappointing loss for us. We’ve got to be able to stop what we’re doing here and change how we’re playing.—F Nick Collison, after getting routed Friday at Toronto.

Roster Report

Rotation: Starters—Point guard Russell Westbrook, Shooting guard Thabo Sefolosha, Small forward Kevin Durant, Power forward Jeff Green, Center Nenad Krstic. Bench—Guard Chucky Atkins, Center Robert Swift, Forward Nick Collison, Guard, Forward Malik Rose, Guard Damien Wilkins, Guard Kyle Weaver.

G Earl Watson hasn’t played in the last seven games, including Friday at Toronto. Thunder coach Scott Brooks has said the demotion of the early-season starter isn’t personal.