The San Antonio Spurs defeated the Oklahoma City Thunder 124-92 in the opening game of the Western Conference semi-finals. Here were the Thunder’s pairing of combustible Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook in Game 1 of the Western Conference semifinals looking like they could hardly, well, bear it. San Antonio didn’t need Tim Duncan’s usual playoff heroics in this game as his heir apparent, LaMarcus Aldridge torched the Thunder with 38 points in three quarters in the wire-to-wire victory.
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Kawhi Leonard 25 points and five rebounds and Danny Green added 18 for San Antonio, who led by as many as 43 points in the game.
Just 4½ minutes into the game, Oklahoma City faced its largest deficit of the playoffs up to that point.
Leonard and Aldridge combined for 45 points in the first half as San Antonio never trailed in the game and shot 82 percent as a team in the opening quarter. Not for the Spurs’ triple-layer defense that held Russell Westbrook to 5-of-19 shooting and 3-of-11 in the restricted area.
With the luxury of resting their starters in the fourth quarter, they will try to build on their hot start when they host Game 2 of the best-of-seven series today (tomorrow morning, Singapore time). “We’ve got to continue to do that”.
“They kind of have every area of the floor pretty well covered”, Thunder coach Billy Donovan said.
Spurs: Aldridge’s postseason career high of 46 points came for Portland against Houston on April 20, 2014.
With the dominant win, the Spurs picked up from where they left off after sweeping the Memphis Grizzlies in four games in the first round. It’s just one game into the series but the Thunder will already be hearing alarm bells as they just couldn’t even slow down the Thunder who exploded for their best offensive performance of the season.
Aldridge was a ideal 15-of-15 from the field when taking a shot off a pass from a teammate, including 6-of-6 on passes from Tony Parker. Their combined dominance was supplemented by the Spurs’ signature ball movement, which helped them win the game by over 30 points.
“After a game like that, you are anxious”, Ginobili said, via Jeff McDonald of the San Antonio Express-News. Westbrook had only two points in the first quarter of Game 1, and didn’t score his first field goal until the second period.
That doesn’t mean they can’t get ready over the next 48 hours.
San Antonio Spurs’ LaMarcus Aldridge goes up for a shot against Dirk Nowitzki of the Dallas Mavericks during their first round playoff matchup.
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“I’m not telling you”, Durant said when asked if he was mad or frustrated by the loss.
