It wasn’t too long ago that the Oklahoma City Thunder were 24-1 and seemingly cruising toward a second straight NBA championship.
“This team is going to win the Emirates Cup,“ David Dennis Jr. of Andscape said earlier this month. “They’re probably going to win the [NBA] championship. They’re going to win more than 73 games…
“We’re going to be talking about the OKC Thunder as maybe the best single-season team that we have ever seen.”
Talk about a record scratch.
Since then, the Thunder are 2-4 with three straight losses to the San Antonio Spurs, most recently 117-102 home loss on Christmas Day.
The Spurs, featuring Victor Wembanyama, De’Aaron Fox, Steph Castle and former Rutgers star Dylan Harper, have won five straight and 8-of-9, with back-to-back wins over the reigning NBA champions in their last two games.
“You don’t lose to a team three times in a row in a short span without them being better than you,” Shai Gilgeous-Alexander told reporters after scoring 22 points in the loss.
“So we have to get better, we have to look in the mirror and that’s everybody from top to bottom if we want to reach out ultimate goal.”
The teams meet two more times during the regular season: Jan. 13 in Oklahoma City and Feb. 4 in San Antonio.