LOS ANGELES — Led by Jalen Williams and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the Oklahoma City Thunder are one of the top isolation teams in the NBA (averaging 11.4 isolations a game so far this season, tied with Boston for most in the league).
It works for them. Last season, they snaked their way into the paint in isolation and put up a 118.3 offensive rating, third-best in the league.
Then the playoffs came. Those driving lanes dried up, teams packed the paint and the Thunder’s offensive rating fell to 110.9 — OKC struggled to score. After being eliminated, the Thunder watched the iso-heavy Celtics — a team who also jacked up more 3-pointers a game than any team in the NBA — go on to win the title.
Lesson learned.
At the urging of coach Mark Daigneault, the Thunder are taking 15.3% more 3s a game this season, from 34.2 attempts a game last season up to 39.4 a night this season. That’s not coming from floor-spacing bigs like Chet Holmgren, it’s almost all from the guards and wings.
The Thunder are 7-0 to start the season.
“It doesn’t matter how you get it done every night, if you win, that’s all that matters. And the teams that have won in the past maybe a decade or so, they’ve shot a lot of 3s,” Gilgeous-Alexander said this past weekend, referencing not only Boston but Golden State and others. “I think that’s why the league’s gone the way it is, because teams want to win.”
‘I appreciate your concern’
Gilgeous-Alexander is averaging 6.6 3-point attempts a game this season, nearly double what he put up a season ago. While a modified jumper looks tighter, SGA is shooting just 28.3% from 3 to start the season.
What does Gilgeous-Alexander say to the people who think he’s taking too many 3s?
“I appreciate your concern.”
Already teams are adjusting. Saturday night, the Clippers, with their strong point-of-attack perimeter defenders, were picking SGA up much higher on the floor to take away those looks.
“It’s not where I want it to be and I’m gonna continue to shoot more,” SGA said after attempting just four 3-pointers against the Clippers. “I feel like I could have shot more tonight… I’m going to shoot them to keep the defense honest.”
Daigneault, a coach more willing to talk Xs and Os than most, was good with Gilgeous-Alexander shooting fewer 3s against the Clippers because he took what the defense gave him.
“A lot of the three point volume for him and [Williams], are to manipulate the pickup point, and if [the defender] is going to try to gap them and just catch their driving game, they’re gonna rise up and shoot that,” Daigneault said. “So I think tonight it was a little bit of taking with the defense gave them, rather than trying to force X amount of threes. Like, if they give you eight, take eight. If they only do it four, you take four.”
Williams admitted this adjustment to more 3s is something he is still working on, with his volume of 3-pointers up but his shooting percentage on them slightly lower this season (still a respectable 38.9%).
“You can’t be afraid to shoot the shots you work on…” Williams said. “It’s a process of getting better. So especially early in the year, you want to make shots, and you want to be as efficient as possible. And there’s also kind of a gray area where you’re trying to work on your game as well. And so I think the more we shoot them, the higher people have to respect it. It’s one of those things you just can’t be afraid to shoot what you work on.”
All About Efficiency
Whether it’s taking more 3s or driving in isolation, for Daigneault it’s all a matter of finding the most efficient shot for his team.
“Well, at the end of the day, offense starts with efficiency. You want an efficient offense, you want the juice to be worth the squeeze on a given possession,” Daigneault said. “You can do that a number of different ways. Usually it’s based on the strengths of your personnel.
“Second of all, I think having some diversity is a good thing. I think if you’re just pumping fastballs all game, no matter how good your fastball is, you can get hit.
“But offense is about creating advantages. At the end of the day you have to have advantage to have efficiency. And I think everybody wants to see beautiful ball movements, but sometimes, most of the time, the beautiful ball movement comes after an advantage is created. And the question becomes, when you have a defense trying to negate that advantage, how do you create it? And there’s only so many ways you can do that, and I think you get to lean into the strengths of your players. And so we’ve been one of the higher ISO teams in the league over the last few years because of [SGA’s] ability to do that. He also gets switched a lot because of our fives, so I think the switching, ISO becomes a solution to the switching to some degree.”
It’s been a slow start to the season offensively for the Thunder, their 110.9 rating is where they were in the playoffs a season ago (and it’s 19th in the league). Oklahoma City is undefeated because of its elite defense.
But the offense is starting to find its footing. When it does, finding a balance of 3-pointers and isolation attacks, Oklahoma City becomes a genuine threat to knocking Boston off the mountaintop.
