{"id":115655,"date":"2025-06-22T03:03:07","date_gmt":"2025-06-22T03:03:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/115655\/"},"modified":"2025-06-22T03:03:07","modified_gmt":"2025-06-22T03:03:07","slug":"how-lu-dort-grew-after-okc-thunders-game-7-loss-in-2020-nba-playoffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/115655\/","title":{"rendered":"How Lu Dort grew after OKC Thunder’s Game 7 loss in 2020 NBA Playoffs"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tears glistened in Lu Dort’s<\/a> eyes while he spoke to the media.<\/p>\n

Even the stellar ball stopper couldn’t prevent some of them from getting past his hardened defense, as they slowly streamed down his baby face.<\/p>\n

The emotions overwhelmed Dort, who’d just scored a career-high 30 points as an undrafted rookie only for OKC to still suffer a Game 7 loss to Houston in the first round of the 2020 NBA playoffs<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“It’s a blessing just to be here,” Dort told reporters with pain-filled pauses. “It didn’t end up going our way, but it was big. It was big. It was a helluva season I had, and I’m grateful for that.”<\/p>\n

Dort still remembers the pain of letting that Game 7 slip through his hands. But they’ve become far more calloused since then, toughened by countless nights of blue-collar contributions to the Thunder<\/a>‘s success.<\/p>\n

Now, nearly five years later, Dort will try to leave his fingerprints on an even bigger Game 7. The biggest one of them all.<\/p>\n

NBA Finals roundtable: How can OKC Thunder win Game 7? What is path for Indiana Pacers?<\/a><\/p>\n

OKC will host Indiana at 7 p.m. Sunday in Game 7 of the NBA Finals<\/a>. The winning team will secure its first NBA championship in franchise history.<\/p>\n

“It was good, especially early in my career,” Dort said Saturday when asked about his 2020 Game 7 experience. “I didn’t know what to expect. I never knew what a Game 7 felt like. Just the nervousness and all of the stuff that you feel before a game like that.<\/p>\n

“I’ve felt that before (now). You’ve just got to approach it like any other game. You go out there and play your best and live with the results.”<\/p>\n

Even the Thunder couldn’t have predicted the perfect storm that was Dort’s Game 7 performance against Houston.<\/p>\n

After going undrafted in 2019, the Arizona State<\/a> alum joined OKC on a two-way contract. That was eventually converted to a standard deal after the season was suspended due to COVID-19.<\/p>\n

Dort cracked the starting lineup with regular-season averages of 6.8 points, 2.3 rebounds and 0.8 assists. They were solid numbers for a sturdy defender with a budding shot.<\/p>\n

But Dort used the bright lights of the playoffs to blossom. The then-21-year-old guard became the youngest player in NBA history to score at least 30 points in a Game 7. And despite going 7 for 38 from deep (18.4%) throughout the first six games of the series, he went 6 for 12 in that department (50%).<\/p>\n

MUSSATTO: Thunder has won its ‘must-win’ games. Now comes Game 7, biggest test of all.<\/a><\/p>\n

Dort’s final 3-point attempt, a potential game winner, was blocked by James Harden<\/a> with about five seconds left in regulation. That sealed Houston’s 104-102 victory.<\/p>\n

Still, there was no denying the obvious. After a lengthy journey from his home country of Canada to college to the G League to the Thunder, Dort had arrived.<\/p>\n

“It was one of the most impressive things that I’ve seen out of a player that young,” Billy Donovan<\/a>, OKC’s head coach at the time, said after the game. “Here’s a guy who was in the G League and never got drafted. … He really did a lot of good things. It was unfortunate at the end of the game that (his) shot got blocked because he was playing so well.”<\/p>\n

Dort also shined on defense in the losing effort.<\/p>\n

Harden’s iconic beard wasn’t the only thing attached to his face throughout the game. So was Dort’s hand.<\/p>\n

Despite averaging a league-leading 34.3 points that season, Harden only finished with 17 points. He went 4 for 15 from the field (26.7%) and 1 for 9 from deep (11.1%).<\/p>\n

CARLSON: Thunder, Pacers have ‘a privilege’ in basketball’s holy grail \u2014 NBA Finals Game 7<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cHe doesn\u2019t care about anything but playing hard,\u201d Harden said of Dort after the game. \u201cAs a young guy coming into this league, that\u2019s all you can ask for. … He has the right mindset of just playing hard and playing balls to the wall, and he don\u2019t care what anybody thinks. He\u2019s gonna have a great career.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Harden was one of the first victims of the “Dorture Chamber,” which has since become one of the most feared forms of punishment in the NBA.<\/p>\n

Dort landed on the All-Defensive first team<\/a> this season for the first time in his career, and he has lived up to that selection in the Finals.<\/p>\n

The 6-foot-4 guard has showcased his versatility by helping defend both Tyrese Haliburton<\/a> and Pascal Siakam<\/a>. He has even knocked down his shots when needed, going 51.7% from deep on 4.8 attempts per game.<\/p>\n

Dort will do whatever it takes to win. That’ll surely be the case Sunday for the fiery competitor, who’s familiar with the burning pain of a Game 7 loss.<\/p>\n

“You know that if you win, you’ll be happy for a long time,” Dort said of Game 7s. “And if you lose, you’ll be mad for a long time. … We know that we’ve got to give it our all.”<\/p>\n

Justin Martinez covers sports for The Oklahoman. Have a story idea for Justin? He can be reached at jmartinez@oklahoman.com or on X\/Twitter at\u00a0@JTheSportsDude. Sign up for the\u00a0Thunder Sports Minute newsletter<\/a>\u00a0to access more NBA coverage. Support Justin’s work and that of other Oklahoman journalists by purchasing a\u00a0digital subscription today at subscribe.oklahoman.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

More: Why Thunder homecourt advantage vs Pacers may be an understatement in Game 7 of NBA Finals<\/a><\/p>\n

NBA Finals Game 7: Thunder vs. Pacers<\/p>\n

TIPOFF: 7 p.m. Sunday at Paycom Center in Oklahoma City (ABC)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tears glistened in Lu Dort’s eyes while he spoke to the media. Even the stellar ball stopper couldn’t…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":115656,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[2126,7,311,840,839,2127,1501,623,257,527,2125,292,194,113,126,517,560,1169,1172,71,842,838,183,1170,70,85,6,1220,11,67,310,179,61,134,114,34,132,211,622,209,66,83,55,2128,312,256,278],"class_list":{"0":"post-115655","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba-playoffs","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-basketball","10":"tag-city","11":"tag-connect","12":"tag-dort","13":"tag-enabled","14":"tag-finals","15":"tag-gilgeous-alexander","16":"tag-haliburton","17":"tag-harden","18":"tag-highlights","19":"tag-houston","20":"tag-houston-rockets","21":"tag-indiana","22":"tag-indiana-pacers","23":"tag-james","24":"tag-james-harden","25":"tag-justin","26":"tag-justin-martinez","27":"tag-local","28":"tag-local-connect","29":"tag-luguentz","30":"tag-luguentz-dort","31":"tag-martinez","32":"tag-national","33":"tag-national-sports","34":"tag-nba","35":"tag-nba-finals","36":"tag-nba-playoffs","37":"tag-news","38":"tag-oklahoma","39":"tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","40":"tag-overall","41":"tag-overall-positive","42":"tag-pacers","43":"tag-playoffs","44":"tag-positive","45":"tag-rockets","46":"tag-shai","47":"tag-shai-gilgeous-alexander","48":"tag-sports","49":"tag-sports-news","50":"tag-story","51":"tag-story-highlights-ai-enabled","52":"tag-thunder","53":"tag-tyrese","54":"tag-tyrese-haliburton"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=115655"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115655\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/115656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=115655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=115655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=115655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}