Game Thread: San Antonio Spurs vs Oklahoma City Thunder

Dec 1, 2022 - 12:30 AM

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Welcome to the Game Thread. Veterans of the Game Thread know how we do things around here, but for all you newbies we have a few rules. Our community guidelines apply and basically say be cool, no personal attacks, don’t troll and don’t swear too much.

The Spurs face another team that’s struggling tonight, the Thunder who could be missing their best player Shai Gilgeous-Alexander with a hip injury and are without 2nd overall pick Chet Holmgren, whose season ended before it started with a bad foot. For the Spurs, every player whose first name starts with ‘J’ could be out tonight, Jeremy Sochan (thigh contusion), Josh Richardson (ankle), Jakob Poeltl (landed wrong after a dunk), Jordan Hall (cut from team), J Blake Wesley (extraneous J), and J Romeo Langford (J back). If Shai is available tonight, his length and scoring ability will be problematic for Tre Jones to contain, and not having Langford available (or even Jordan Hall) could mean big minutes for Malaki Branham, which might be fun to watch, but not on the defensive end for Spurs fans.

Tonight would be a good time for Devin Vassell and Keldon Johnson to both have a solid offensive games at the same time, because if only one of them goes off, it probably won’t be enough to overcome OKC’s prodigious offensive output, ranking 6th in the league. Like the Spurs, their weakness is defense, 28th in the league, but still better than the dead-last Spurs defense. If the Spurs lose tonight and the Rockets can beat the Nuggets, the Spurs will be in last place in the west, which is where most people expected them to end up, but maybe not this soon. It’s not about the wins and losses (well, maybe the losses), but hopefully the Spurs can come out of their minibreak of a few days with the same kind of energy they showed against the Lakers in their last game and make this one a fun watch.

Game Prediction:

Coach Popovich will rest so many players that they will have to bring Jordan Hall back one more time just to field enough players to allow the game to proceed.

One final word:

Go Spurs GOOOOOO!!

San Antonio Spurs at Oklahoma City Thunder
November 30, 2022 | 7:00 PM CT
Streaming: NBA League Pass
TV: Bally Sports Southwest SA

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