ALEX CARUSO POUNCED, ripping the basketball away from Memphis Grizzlies guard Scotty Pippen Jr. in the final minute of Game 3 in the first round of the playoffs.
The Grizzlies, trailing by three points, desperately needed to generate a good shot on this possession of their first-round series against the Oklahoma City Thunder. They came into the game down 2-0 in the series, and they had already watched their once unassailable 29-point lead evaporate. But with Ja Morant watching from the tunnel while propped up on crutches, the Grizzlies’ offense seemed to have no chance.
Memphis guard Desmond Bane didn’t see anything worth probing as he came off a high pick-and-roll with Luguentz Dort on his hip and 7-footer Chet Holmgren hedging. Bane’s slightly off-target pass to Pippen on the left wing gave Caruso time to close from his help position. Pippen was pinned and took a jab step to create room, exposing the ball to Caruso, who ripped it away as Dort dove to recover it.
The Thunder’s smothering defense had stolen this game. Oklahoma City wasn’t giving it back.
The Thunder conducted a defensive clinic in the second half, completing the second-largest comeback in playoff history.
Memphis fell victim to the league’s top-ranked defense, which made it almost impossible for the Grizzlies to get a shot up. The Grizzlies finished the second half with more turnovers committed (13) than buckets made (9-of-36 shooting).
“Our defense is our superpower,” Caruso said after the Thunder’s comeback win. “When we’re locked in on that side of the ball, we’re an unstoppable force.”
Oklahoma City has been an unstoppable force more often than not this season, cruising to a league-best 68 wins before sweeping Memphis. The Thunder shattered the NBA record for best point differential in a season (plus-12.9 points per game), powered by one of the most dominant defenses in recent memory. Oklahoma City’s stifling success is the result of a remarkable blend of talent, tenacity and togetherness.
The stifling defense that fueled the Thunder’s historic dominance this season, along with the steady, sensational play of scoring champion and MVP favorite Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, is being tested in the Western Conference semifinals. Three-time MVP Nikola Jokic, a giant with a soft shooting touch and brilliant basketball mind, poses problems even against perfect defensive execution. They’ll face their next test against the Nuggets in Game 3 in Denver on Friday (10:00 p.m. ET, ESPN).
“It felt like seven pit bulls out there. Not five,” Cleveland Cavaliers coach Kenny Atkinson after the Thunder converted 22 turnovers into 30 points in a Jan. 16 blowout over the team with the Eastern Conference’s best record. “They were scratching, reaching — in a good sense. Their speed and athleticism, they kind of toppled us over. It was that simple. That’s their calling card.”
GILGEOUS-ALEXANDER WAS a bit sheepish about the 2023-24 Defensive Player of the Year balloting. He finished seventh, receiving a pair of second-place votes, likely due to leading the league with 150 steals. He was the only Oklahoma City player on any ballots, which he says didn’t reflect the reality of the Thunder’s defensive recipe.
Gilgeous-Alexander stands out defensively for those who study box scores. He’s ranked among the league’s top five in steals in each of the past three seasons. In that span, he has averaged at least 1.5 steals and 1.0 blocks per game twice. Only two other players have combined to match that total during that time frame, with a minimum of 65 games played in a season: Golden State’s former Defensive Player of the Year Draymond Green this season and Caruso with the Chicago Bulls last season.
But Gilgeous-Alexander appreciates that he has the luxury of taking the least demanding defensive assignment, allowing him to frequently operate like a ball-hawking free safety. After the additions of Caruso and center Isaiah Hartenstein this past summer, Gilgeous-Alexander might not merit a spot on an OKC-only first-team All-Defensive squad.
Dort, a barrel-chested 6-foot-4, 220-pound bully with ballerina’s feet, always guards the opponent’s best perimeter scorer, taking immense pride in typically holding his man well below his average. It’s a source of outrage in Oklahoma City that Dort isn’t one of the NBA’s most decorated defenders, having never made an All-Defensive team despite opponents actively prioritizing getting the elite perimeter pest off their stars. He finished fourth in Defensive Player of the Year voting this season.
“There’s not many guys as big and as strong as Lu that could move as well as he does laterally,” Gilgeous-Alexander told ESPN. “He’s kind of a freak athlete in his own way. And then he’s really worked at it, understanding the game and understanding his opponents. His first couple of years he was obviously really good defensively and he’d get caught on certain things. He’s erased all of those.”
Dort’s combination of strength and nimble feet make him a menacing one-on-one defender. According to NBA Advanced Stats, Dort allowed only 0.69 points per possession this season in isolation situations.
“You think that he’s just a big body and it’ll be easy to screen,” Hartenstein said. “I don’t know how, but he can get small, too. He just gets through the screens. I think that’s what makes him special — that combination of physicality and then his agility, too.”
Wing Jalen Williams often takes the second-toughest assignment, unless second-year stopper Cason Wallace is in the starting lineup. With Caruso and/or Wallace coming off the bench, there’s no relief for an opposing star when the reserves check into the game. And if a foe manages to maneuver into the paint, Holmgren or Hartenstein — or sometimes both big men — await.
“You don’t really have a weak link,” Hartenstein told ESPN. “When you have your stars playing at a high level defensively, everyone has to lock in. Just seeing your top guys are making those sacrifices, everyone kind of has to buy in. So I think that it starts with them and then the rest.”
Oklahoma City’s players spread the credit amongst themselves. While Gilgeous-Alexander credits several others for Oklahoma City’s defensive prowess, his teammates point to him for setting the standard of commitment. Dort appreciates being recognized as the best on-ball defender on the Thunder. However, he’s quick to point out that Caruso and Wallace are more dangerous than him defending “in the gaps,” which is why they’re such disruptive playmakers.
“I’m good with my body,” Dort said. “They’re really good with their hands.”
Caruso, who was acquired from the Bulls in a swap for Josh Giddey, is the most honored perimeter stopper on the Oklahoma City roster, earning a first-team All-Defensive selection in 2022-23 and a second-team spot last season. But there is no debate inside the locker room about who is the best of the pests. Caruso and Wallace give the nod to Dort.
“Cason is a close third,” Caruso said, glancing at his young teammate a couple of locker stalls over to make sure Wallace heard him.
While none of Oklahoma City’s rotation players need protection — and several pride themselves as lockdown defenders — the Thunder rarely leave their stoppers on an island. According to GeniusIQ tracking, Oklahoma City brought a help defender on 77% of drives this season, the fifth-highest rate in the league. The Thunder doubled on 8.0 paint touches per game, the most in the NBA.
It’s more about harassing than helping when the Thunder send a second defender, though. It’s controlled chaos, made possible by precise game planning and constant communication. When Oklahoma City’s defense is at its peak, the opponents don’t know what’s coming, and the Thunder know exactly where their teammates will be.
The Thunder’s defensive dominance is the epitome of a collective effort, but there is a bit of competitiveness between the individuals involved.
“We haven’t said it out loud, but iron sharpens iron,” Caruso told ESPN. “You see somebody competing at a certain level, playing at a certain level, you have no choice but to match that. And if you don’t, you get left behind.”
THE THUNDER DOUBLED down on defense this season after ranking fourth in defensive rating (111.0 points allowed per 100 possessions) in 2023-24 en route to becoming the youngest No. 1 playoff seed in league history. After a second-round exit, general manager Sam Presti targeted Caruso in the trade market and Hartenstein in free agency. A premier perimeter defender and an excellent rim protector were added to the potent mix, as well as a pair of veterans with high basketball IQs and loud voices.
The Thunder have the personnel to allow head coach Mark Daigneault and defensive coordinator Dave Bliss to vary their schemes and styles, from pairing their two 7-footers together to featuring scrambling, small-ball lineups. There are no simple answers against the Oklahoma City defense, which employs several players opponents prefer to avoid and none that are easy targets to attack.
“They rely heavily on their defensive stoppers,” Dallas Mavericks star Kyrie Irving said after a loss in Oklahoma City this season, “which there are practically five of them out there at one time.”
The Thunder’s defensive rating improved to 106.6 this season despite Holmgren, one of the league’s best shot blockers, fracturing his pelvis and being sidelined for a few months. Oklahoma City allowed 2.5 points per 100 possessions fewer than any other team, the biggest difference between the first- and second-ranked defenses since 2015-16.
The scrappy, swarming Thunder also led the league in steals (10.3 per game), turnovers forced (17.0) and points created off of turnovers (21.8) by comfortable margins. Both the steals and points off turnovers rank as the most of any team in this millennium — and those numbers increased to averages of 10.8 steals and 26.3 points off of turnovers in the Thunder’s first-round sweep of the Grizzlies.
That trend has continued into the second round, although the series is even after the opening two games in Oklahoma City, thanks to Jokic leading the Nuggets on an improbable comeback from a double-digit deficit in Game 1. The Thunder have scored 57 points off 39 forced turnovers in the two games.
After the Thunder evened the series with a 149-106 blowout win Wednesday, Daigneault was adamant that Oklahoma City didn’t make significant defensive scheme adjustments between games, attributing the improvement to simply being “a lot sharper.” But the Thunder did make one notable adjustment between games: The team mostly deployed the brawnier Hartenstein and third big Jaylin Williams to defend Jokic rather than Holmgren.
Holmgren, however, ended up switching onto Jokic for one particular possession late in the first quarter that epitomized this Oklahoma City squad at its best.
Jokic sensed an opportunity to bully the skinny Holmgren and established position deep in the paint. But length got the upper hand on strength, as Holmgren maneuvered to reach his left arm around his 280-pound foe and flick away the entry pass.
Wallace dashed in from the corner to bat the ball away as Jokic tried to recover it. Dort, one of three Oklahoma City players in the paint, snatched the loose ball like a rebound.
“Everybody was flying around,” Holmgren said postgame, a general comment about the Thunder’s defensive effort throughout the night that especially applied to this possession.
Dort immediately found Gilgeous-Alexander, who needed only five dribbles and five seconds to get from the top of the key in the backcourt to the bucket, slithering through traffic before finishing with a pretty scoop.
That sequence — producing two of the Thunder’s 34 points off turnovers in the rout — is exactly what Daigneault envisions when he often refers to the game as “interconnected.”
Oklahoma City’s defense doesn’t just stop its opponents from scoring. It starts the Thunder’s offense.
That’s how Oklahoma City won 68 games during the regular season and advanced to the second round. And it’s how the Thunder hope to eliminate a few more playoff foes.
“I didn’t really look at tonight as a response as much as I looked at tonight as just us being who we are,” Daigneault said after the series-tying win. “And that’s how we’ve been all season.”
ESPN Research’s Matt Williams contributed to this report.
Source: espn.com