Through the first two games of their first-round series against the Portland Trail Blazers, the Oklahoma City Thunder have offered little resistance to Damian Lillard & Co.
Lillard is averaging 29.5 points, five assists and four rebounds per game while C.J. McCollum is averaging 28.5 points and four assists through the first two games.
Lillard and McCollum are among the best in the league and are expected to lead their team each night. But, on the other side, Russell Westbrook and Paul George haven’t done much to counter those two.
Westbrook is putting up 19 points, 10.5 assists and 9.5 rebounds on 35.1 percent shooting from the field and just 10 percent from 3-point range. Meanwhile, George is averaging 26.5 points but is only shooting 27.3 percent from deep.
On Tuesday, Westbrook had 14 points, 11 assists and nine rebounds but went 5-of-20 from the field and 1-of-6 from beyond the arc. The performance was anything but spectacular and Westbrook acknowledged as much.
Starting with myself, I gotta play better. Tonight, the loss, I’m gonna take full responsibility of tonight because the way that I played was unacceptable and I’m going to be better. So, I’m not worried one bit. My job is to make sure I continue to come out here and will and lead our guys and make sure we have a chance to win a game.
George turned in a much better overall performance in Game 2 by shooting 11-of-20 from the field. He was more aggressive in driving to the rim and was successful in the paint. For a guy battling a shoulder issue, that was certainly encouraging. George still struggled from deep, though, hitting only two of his seven attempts.
The Thunder will certainly be hoping that returning to the friendly confines of Chesapeake Energy Arena will help turn things around. Trailing 2-0 in the series, Westbrook told reporters after Game 2 that he is not worried and still has confidence in his team.
They won their first two home games. Obviously, we wanted to try to steal one while we can but let’s just stay with it. We’re a great basketball team. A lot of great guys on this team that I trust in to make shots and make plays on both sides of the basketball and we’ll be all right.
As Westbrook and the team have said, the series is far from over but they may very well be facing a must-win situation in Game 3 on Friday night — no matter what they want to say publicly or not.
Surprisingly enough, the Thunder open as 7.5-point favorites at home on Friday night.
