OKLAHOMA CITY — Alex Caruso watched from the Thunder bench a few games back, and while the opponent has escaped his memory, the defensive sequence was seared into his brain.
Cason Wallace guarded the man with the ball, and when he drove, Wallace forced him wide, into the zip code of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, and SGA dang near stole the ball.
The opponent quickly retreated, and Wallace almost stole the ball coming back. A screener came over to offer relief, but Luguentz Dort switched onto the ball. That usually doesn’t turn out well for Thunder foes. The foe tried to drive, and Santa Clara Williams was in the gap.
That’s all Caruso remembers, but those few seconds of futility remain a marvel.
“There’s no soft spots in our defense at any time,” Caruso said. “The statistics are showing up how they are because we’ve got so many guys that are elite defenders in the league.”
People are also reading…
Thunder Pelicans Basketball
New Orleans Pelicans guard CJ McCollum looks to pass the ball in front of Oklahoma City Thunder guard Alex Caruso. Caruso arrived this summer via a trade for Josh Giddey. Tyler Kaufman, Associated Press
Tell the Mavericks about it. The Thunder beat Dallas 118-104 on Tuesday night to reach the NBA Cup semifinals, and the Mavs were glad to get out of Dodge with their uniforms. The Thunder stole everything else.
Dallas committed 18 turnovers, 14 of them Thunder steals. OKC outscored the Mavs 36-17 in points off turnovers; a 19-point deficit in a game in which the Thunder won by 18. Nothing coincidental about those numbers.
Playing against this Thunder team is like sword-fighting Zorro; the Thunder has been stealing the ball and stealing the dignity from foes all season long.
Steals are live-ball turnovers, and live-ball turnovers are offensive igniters.
The Thunder leads the NBA in steals (12.2 per game) and points off turnovers (23.1), the latter by the healthy margin of 2.3 over second-place Orlando. OKC also leads the NBA in fewest turnovers, 11.8 per game.
That’s right. The Thunder has more steals than turnovers, which is a crazy statistic. Sort of like a baseball power hitter with more home runs than strikeouts. Or a quarterback with more touchdown passes than incompletions.
No way that can last, right? Maybe wrong. It’s lasted through 24 games, 29 percent of the season. And the way the Thunder bulldogs opponents, this looks like the blueprint to win the Western Conference.
The maniacal on-ball defense of Dort, Caruso and Wallace. The deflections of long-armed Gilgeous-Alexander and Williams. The size of Isaiah Hartenstein, who is making up for the months-long loss of injured shot-blocking whiz Chet Holmgren.
Thunder Rockets Basketball
Houston Rockets guard Fred VanVleet shoots against Oklahoma City Thunder guard Cason Wallace. Ashley Landis, Associated Press
The Thunder even baited Dallas into turnovers Tuesday night by playing some football-style pass coverage, daring deep passes on fast-breaks. Three times OKC swiped 50-foot lobs from Luka Doncic.
“There’s a reason they’re the No. 1 defensive team in the league,” said Doncic, who had more turnovers (six) than baskets (five, on 15 shots) en route to 16 points. “They have great defensive players.”
That’s what Sam Presti envisioned when he put this roster together. Dort, we’ve always known about. Same with Caruso, who arrived this summer via a trade for Josh Giddey. But Thunder scouts identified Wallace as a potential defensive dynamo on the perimeter, and he’s been that.
Even Gilgeous-Alexander (by the Clippers, in 2018) and Williams (by the Thunder, in 2022) were drafted as defensive stalwarts. The Thunder struck gold when both turned into all-star caliber offensive players, too.
But all of a sudden, the Thunder is full of versatile, elite defenders. OKC has the NBA’s best defense by yet another wide margin (103.4 points per 100 possessions, a full two points ahead of runnerup Houston).
Mark Daigneault can mix and match his lineups and always have an on-ball dynamo or two on the court, and a couple of rangy perimeter defenders, and versatility everywhere (thank you, Santa Clara and Kenrich Williams).
Remember the Jack Nicholson/Joker line from the 1989 Batman? “Where does he get all those wonderful toys?”
The sporting world usually reserves that for offensive surplus. But NBA coaches have to be quite envious of the defensive weapons available to Daigneault.
Daigneault’s mind always seems to be racing with possibilities. Seems like maybe it went into overdrive last summer, when this roster took shape.
“I think that’s fair,” Daigneault said the other day. “You’re always trying to bend what you’re doing to the strengths and vulnerabilities of your personnel. So sometimes, defensively, you gotta bend to the vulnerabilities of somebody that might bring an offensive punch to your team.”
Except the vulnerable isn’t that much of a weakness. When both Hartenstein and Holmgren were sidelined, Santa Clara was asked to guard the post, and he held up reasonably well and the Thunder kept winning. Heck, Tuesday night, the Thunder was outscored by six points with Hartenstein on the court. OKC outscored Dallas by 20 when playing small against the much-bigger Mavs.
APTOPIX Thunder Spurs Basketball
San Antonio Spurs' Stephon Castle, bottom center, falls as he goes to the basket against Oklahoma City Thunder's Jalen Williams (8) and Luguentz Dort. Darren Abate, Associated Press
Chalk up that success to the ball pressure applied by the likes of Dort and Caruso and Wallace and SGA and Santa Clara.
“The amount we’ve pressured this year is more than we’ve ever pressured, like up the floor, picking up the ball higher,” Daigneault said. “You’re kind of like making the floor bigger for the opponent, to access that pressure, which puts you in longer closeouts, and potentially puts guys more on an island. But you can bet on that a little more when you’ve got kind of the individual defenders that we have.”
Santa Clara held up well inside in part because his pals on the perimeter refused to give opponents clear passing lanes. And while we were impressed with his ability to survive the post, we sometimes forget how good he is on the perimeter.
Caruso put it succinctly.
“Dub is playing phenomenally defense for us, impacting the ball,” Caruso said. “On-ball especially, he just takes the ball from guys. Not many people in the NBA, professional basketball, just get the ball taken from them. Like, they’re really good players. So that speaks to the level of skill he has.
“And he’s probably, people would say, what? Maybe our fourth-best defender? People would put me, Case and Lu in front of him, by name. Just the depth of talent we have defensively is just special, man.”
It’s like Doncic. Nothing secret about why the Thunder has a great defense — it’s great defenders, and if they keep stripping the ball with the sword of Zorro, this season indeed will be special in Oklahoma City.
berry.tramel@tulsaworld.com
0 Comments
Get in the game with our Prep Sports Newsletter
Sent weekly directly to your inbox!