OKC Goes Ham

Ok, seriously? You get your team together for a game, show some spirit and energy to make a late game surge to seal a close one and lead everyone to believe you're maturing into the coaching role that has been thrust upon you. Then you coach like tonight. Yikes, Kaleb. Not cool, my man.

Again, blame the inexperience of the coach for the loss tonight. Not much more to say. Down 18 at the half in large part due to ineffective use of the zone defense. This defensive scheme has worked in the recent past to disrupt another team's flow, but the score would suggest this is not the case in this particular matchup. So, halftime over, Kaleb changes that. The halftime adjustments are working, Blazers hit a 19-2 run to close a large gap to within 3. Holy donuts, that's impressive. But, we can't keep it up. The lead stretches to 9. Uh oh, it's slipping to double digits now. Yuck, 15. Timeout is called, all right good. Time to make some moves. But, what have we here? The moves made are...go back to zone? Seriously?

Despite that blockheadedness, I feel like the team got some good, albeit streaky playing time. Flynn needs to keep his head up and learn to pass. Nolan needs to also do that because tonight he was not the guard he knows how to be. His first ever start, so it makes sense, but come on. Also, good on JJ for being on, but some passing could be good too.

Mostly, we just need to box out and rebound, and play some defense. And I hate floppers, but we were playing Derek "Flop like a" Fish-er, so taking a few more charges this game could have helped. Adjusting the defense to Westbrook was a necessity  that was apparently never addressed. Hard to believe seeing how poor of a shooter he is when defended well, and he went yard tonight. Scoring 10 straight from the same exact spot SCREAMS a change to me but, despite a timeout late, he kept it going. Which just feeds his already over-confident ego and turns him into an even bigger sack of douche, but if we're not gonna guard him of course he'll feel like he's a badass. To be clear, you put Batum or Matthews on him like glue, the only badass thing you'll see is their stellar defense. He'll start bitching more than Lewis Black.

Anyway, props tonight to Hickson and Matthews. Matthews because he had an off-ish shooting night and still had 17, 6 and 4 without a TO and played 34 minutes, as he always does. Baller.

Nolan, sir, you're the low brow with Crawful tonight. Embrace your role and own it, my man. Crawford, yeesh. Sure some fouls weren't called (except on you), but you were so off that even I wasn't calling for many of them. It's their job and you're a jumpshooter, so they should be all over it, but you weren't all over your job either. 2 points on 1 for 7, 2TO...