The Oklahoma City Thunder passed a major test on Wednesday, taking down the Golden State Warriors 108-91 and proving they can hang with the best teams in the league, despite their rough start to the NBA season.
Head coach Billy Donovan is hoping this isn't just a one-game act, but rather a trend they can follow moving forward as this team becomes more familiar with each other and uses outings like Wednesday's as motivation to strive for even more improvement.
“I think it starts with our focus and our concentration, the ability to sustain,” said Donovan, according to Erik Horne of The Oklahoman. “It was encouraging to see us have an attention to detail and sustain that focus and concentration for 48 minutes. Today's a new day. Hopefully we've shown we can do that. We've got to do that more consistently. That's where it starts for us, I think in this game… besides their personnel and who they have and what they do offensively.”
The Thunder were sharp and capitalized on every mistake the Warriors made through the game, making them pay incessantly throughout the first three quarters, then finishing out in the fourth, as Donovan left his starters in the game even well after Kerr had taken his out.
The helmsman learned his lesson from early 2016, when even with a hobbled Stephen Curry, the Warriors were able to complete a comeback on the road after the latter buried a long three-point jumper to steal the win.
OKC now faces another tough matchup against the Detroit Pistons, who are second in the East and hungry to make this a closely contested outing against one of the West's best.
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