Thunder vs. Pacers NBA Finals: OKC looks uncomfortable, and now its dr
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INDIANAPOLIS — As Oklahoma City Thunder general manager Sam Presti turned the corner of the concourse in the bowels of Gainbridge Fieldhouse, following a 116-107 loss to the Indiana Pacers in Game 3 of the NBA Finals, a look of concern covered the face of one of the smartest men in basketball.
This is what the Pacers do. This is what they have been doing. They make opponents uncomfortable, and the Thunder, now trailing the best-of-seven championship series, 2-1, are as uncomfortable as they have been all season. Presti’s 68-win juggernaut — the one so heavily favored in this series; the one we figured for a budding dynasty — is two losses from the franchise’s best season ending short of a championship.
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Thunder head coach Mark Daigneault found all sorts of ways to describe this loss by his young team as “uncharacteristic,” and he found even more ways to say, “They outplayed us the majority of the game.”
“The turnovers were uncharacteristic,” Daigneault said of his team’s 19 giveaways, one shy of a season high. “Obviously, we’re usually pretty clean there. I give them credit. I thought they played really well.”
The Pacers played phenomenally, mostly because the Thunder did not apply the defensive pressure they usually do. Indiana had something to do with that, too, playing so fast Oklahoma City could not settle into its defensive pressure. It is hard to be physical with someone when you cannot catch them.
“Just the pace of their offense was sharper than our pressure and physicality tonight,” said Daigneault. “That’s just what it came down to. They got the ball ahead of us more easily tonight than they did in the first two games. That led to a lot of the downstream effects of their offense and our defense tonight.”
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Mostly, though, the Thunder were not themselves, especially in the fourth quarter, when the league’s MVP, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, a machine, attempted only three shots and failed to register an assist.
“It felt like they won all…
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