What we learned from OKC's Game 3 domination of the Warriors

The Thunder went small, went fast and ran Golden State out of their building

By Matt Moore

May 22, 2016 at 11:48 pm ET • 4 min read

Here's what we learned from the Thunder's 133-105 destruction of the Golden State Warriors on Sunday in Game 3 of the Western Conference finals.

1. Well ... that escalated quickly

Oklahoma City absolutely blasted the Warriors to pieces. It was annihilation in every category. The Thunder won the statistical categories of:

Points, rebounds, offensive rebounds, assists, free throws, free-throw percentage, blocks, turnovers, field-goal percentage, 3-point percentage, points in the paint, fast-break points and second-chance points.

The Warriors did have more steals, though.

2. When the team that loves chaos gets beat by chaos

Against the Spurs, the Thunder slowed the pace, ground the game out and played isolation-heavy basketball. In Game 3 against the Warriors, the Thunder just ran. They pushed the ball constantly, attacking and finding quick shots, quick passes and stayed in attack mode for a full 36 minutes until the outcome was assured.

The big adjustment that led to this was the Thunder uncorking a smallball unit that featured Russell Westbrook, Andre Roberson, Dion Waiters, Kevin Durant and Serge Ibaka. The difference between that and the smallball lineups OKC used that were disastrous against the Spurs was A. substituting Ibaka for Enes Kanter and B. using Roberson more commonly in power forward sets. That lineup finished plus-30 in just 12 minutes, and completely neutralized the Warriors' "Death" lineup of Steph Curry-Klay Thompson-Harrison Barnes-Andre Iguodala-Draymond Green.

That Warriors lineup has dominated every team it has faced the past two seasons. In Game 3, that lineup was a minus-22 in seven minutes. It got run off the floor. Maybe that was an outlier. Maybe it was a turning point. But it definitely told the story in Game 3 and will have a great deal to say in Game 4 as both teams look to make adjustments.

The pace was straight-up ludicrous speed when that Thunder smallball unit was on the floor, at 123 possessions per 48 minutes. For comparison, the Thunder played at a 99 pace in the regular season. OKC basically morphed into a starship and blasted up and down the floor. Can the Thunder keep up their endurance with a 48-hour turnaround? Can you really beat the Warriors, who pretty much invented winning fast (with defense), at their own game?

3. Draymond Green and a kick to the kiwis

The predominant question over the next 24 hours leading up to Game 4 will be about Draymond Green and whether this kick to the private parts/bathing suit region/groin of Steven Adams will result in a suspension. Green was adamant after the game that he did not intend to kick him between the legs.

Draymond: "I don't know how anybody could say I did that on purpose regardless of how it looks."
— Marcus Thompson (@ThompsonScribe) May 23, 2016

Warriors' Draymond Green told @TheUndefeated he hoped to see OKC's Steven Adams after game to tell him kick wasn't intention & to apologize.
— Marc J. Spears (@MarcJSpearsESPN) May 23, 2016

However, as this was the second time in three games that Green has hit Adams in that particular region, the Thunder of course feel that it was purposeful. This is going to be huge, because if Green is suspended for Game 4, it could wind up deciding the series.

Steve Kerr and Green both said that not only do they feel he won't be suspended, but that the flagrant foul will actually be rescinded.

4. The Warriors missed a lot of shots they can make ... for a while

Golden State missed a lot of good looks in the first quarter against OKC, and that seemed to get the Warriors out of rhythm. It's a similar trend to what we saw in Game 1, only without the first-half burst. When the Warriors don't make shots, they get urgent. They start to press, and that makes it worse.

The Warriors actually finished with more contested shots (48) than uncontested shots (44) and shot a pretty decent percentage (43 percent) on uncontested shots. That's not great, but it's not "unbelievable" either. Even the 39.6 percent on the contested shots wasn't terrible.

The concern is how poor most of those shots were.

5. The Thunder punished the Warriors with urgency

Take a look at this. It's from PopcornMachine.net and shows the run at the end of the first half when the Warriors' "Death" lineup was run off the floor. Notice how quick the shots are for the Thunder after the Warriors miss.

That's total disaster for the Warriors. OKC just ran the ball down their throat and the Warriors were largely helpless to stop it. They kept trying to will the ball in, and when those shots that always seem to fall for them didn't, the Warriors were not in a position to stop the onslaught.

6. Russell Westbrook was sublime

Westbrook finished with 30 points, eight rebounds, 12 assists, two steals and four turnovers on 10-of-19 shooting. Westbrook trusted the Thunder in Game 3, especially Andre Roberson, who is very easy to ignore given his shooting woes and how the Warriors are guarding him. But Westbrook made the pass consistently, and Roberson made good on it.

Westbrook also finally converted inside, hitting 7 of 10 shots in the paint, an area he's struggled in all series. It was the kind of game that you fear from him. And on top of that, Kevin Durant had 33 points on 15 shots. You're just not going to win many games when that happens, and you're going to get blown out when you shoot 41 percent from the field.