In the loss to the Memphis Grizzlies a week ago, the Oklahoma City Thunder led midway through the third quarter before falling apart and losing. Against the Boston Celtics on Saturday, the OKC went into the fourth with a lead but only managed 14 points in the final frame.
Against the Toronto Raptors on Wednesday, the Thunder flipped the script, holding the Raptors to just 14 fourth-quarter points to get a comeback 113-103 victory.
“Tonight I thought we did it with stops,” Daigneault said. “We kept them off the scoreboard and held them to one shot per possession down the stretch.”
Oklahoma City was able to do this short-handed. In addition to the absences of usual starters Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Lu Dort, Darius Bazley and Al Horford, rookie Aleksej Pokusevski, backup guard Ty Jerome and big Mike Muscala were also injured.
This left nine active players, none of whom has a full season of starts under his belt, and only one of whom has even reached 60 total starts in his career.
But the Thunder absolutely dominated the glass, out-rebounding Toronto 64 to 35, and grabbed 19 offensive rebounds, including seven from Moses Brown and four from Isaiah Roby.
“On the offensive [rebounding] end, I just thought it’s a good barometer of our competitiveness. I thought we made great extra efforts and kept balls alive,” Daigneault said. “I just thought we went after it. The competitive level was really, really good for 48 minutes.”
The rebounding, the tough second-half defense that prevented Pascal Siakam from getting back to the free throw line after he had 10 attempts in the first half, and a scoring outburst from Svi Mykhailiuk helped the Thunder put it away.
Here’s the fourth quarter, based on quotes from the team:
