The Houston Rockets and the Oklahoma City Thunder were involved in quite a nail-biter on Monday night, with the Thunder escaping with a tightly-contested Game 6 victory, 104-100. OKC's victory was thanks in large part to Chris Paul's outstanding play down the stretch — something the Rockets star Russell Westbrook played down during his post-game interview.
According to Westbrook, Houston's tendency to lose close games to the Thunder is more of a knock on them as opposed to Paul's ability to step up in the clutch:
How much of Thunder's success closing games this series a credit to Chris Paul?
"I mean, a lot of the mistakes that we’ve made in close games have been on us, to be honest," Russell Westbrook said, citing turnovers. "It’s kind of been on us, to be completely honest."
— Tim MacMahon (@espn_macmahon) September 1, 2020
The Rockets star isn't wrong here. As a matter of fact, it was he himself that committed a couple of key turnovers late in the game, including an errand pass out of bounds with less than 10 seconds remaining in the contest. This allowed the Thunder to win possession of the basketball, and eventually close out the contest.
Westbrook actually had a pretty good game on Monday, especially considering how mightily he struggled in Game 5. The former MVP finished with 17 points on 8-of-15 shooting, with four rebounds, three assists, and a steal. However, he turned the ball over seven times throughout the contest, and some of them were during the most crucial junctures of the game.
After the disappointing loss, Westbrook was quick to take the blame on behalf of the Rockets for this one:
Russell Westbrook on why the Rockets had issues with turnovers tonight, which hasn’t been a problem for them during this series: “That was my fault, honestly. Last game I had zero, tonight I had seven.”
— Mark Berman (@MarkBermanFox26) September 1, 2020
Despite Westbrook's attempt to play down Paul's outstanding play, there's no denying that the Thunder star was clutch in Game 6. Paul drained a couple of key triples late in the contest to seal the deal for OKC, as they forced a pivotal Game 7 scheduled for Wednesday.