{"id":696755,"date":"2026-04-03T23:09:18","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T23:09:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/696755\/"},"modified":"2026-04-03T23:09:18","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T23:09:18","slug":"threats-to-thunder-championship-repeat-now-crystal-clear-after-dismantling-of-lakers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/696755\/","title":{"rendered":"Threats to Thunder championship repeat now crystal clear after dismantling of Lakers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Before Lakers star Luka Don\u010di\u0107 exited with a hamstring injury<\/a> Thursday night, the OKC Thunder had just put on a defensive clinic against one of the hottest players and teams in the association.<\/p>\n

In his 25 minutes of action, the point guard, who had scored 30-plus points in 13 straight games, had 12 points on 3-for-10 shooting and had already committed six turnovers.<\/p>\n

The Thunder\u2019s ball pressure and activity behind the play make them the best defense relative to league average ever<\/a>. If you’re reliant on single-sided offensive attacks from one player, OKC will have its way with you, much like it did in its 43-point rout of the Lakers.<\/p>\n

Thursday night\u2019s performance made it clear that only three teams pose unique matchup difficulties to Oklahoma City’s title defense, and the Lakers aren\u2019t one of them.<\/p>\n

So, here are the three teams that can exploit some of the weaknesses of the defending champs moving forward.<\/p>\n

Biggest threat to Thunder repeat comes down to three teams<\/p>\n

San Antonio Spurs<\/p>\n

No team has demonstrated more potential to challenge the Thunder than the San Antonio Spurs.<\/p>\n

It’s not advisable to draw foregone conclusions from small sample sizes, but four wins with a plus-11.75-point differential isn\u2019t something to scoff at. More important than the Spurs\u2019 4-1 record against the Thunder this season, though, is how San Antonio beat Oklahoma City, which all starts with Victor Wembanyama.<\/p>\n

While OKC has the seventh-best offense in the association, a clear weakness is its three-point shooting, giving Wembanyama confidence in roaming off certain players.<\/p>\n

Outside of Chet Holmgren and Jaylin Williams, Wembanyama\u2019s most frequent defensive assignment when playing the Thunder has been\u00a0Alex Caruso, who is shooting 26.9 percent on\u00a0open to wide-open looks from deep this season<\/a>.<\/p>\n

As a team, OKC is converting on just\u00a037.0 percent of its wide-open attempts from deep<\/a>.<\/p>\n

That poor shooting across the board, and from one of OKC\u2019s key playoff contributors, will only empower Wemby to continue being the most disruptive roamer in the league.<\/p>\n

Denver Nuggets<\/p>\n

The Denver Nuggets were one game away from changing the course of Oklahoma City history just a season ago. Thankfully, Loud City’s defense righted that ship and delivered the organization\u2019s first championship.<\/p>\n

That being said, Nikola Joki\u0107 is still a big problem.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s not forget that Joki\u0107 posted 28\/14\/6 on 47.9 percent shooting<\/a> in the seven games against the Thunder during last year\u2019s playoff run, including two 40-point outbursts.<\/p>\n

This season, the big man has averaged a 23-point triple-double against OKC,\u00a0albeit coming in three losses. He is the ultimate problem solver,\u00a0and even without a healthy team in those losses, the Nuggets incrementally increased their scoring total from 111 in the first loss to 126 in the most recent.<\/p>\n

Joki\u0107\u2019s size, IQ, and offensive ingenuity make him the Thunder\u2019s toughest individual cover. While Chet Holmgren is one of the game\u2019s elite rim protectors, he lacks the girth to battle down low with the Joker.<\/p>\n

What about Isaiah Harternstein?\u00a0Well, just take a look at how that went<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Defending Joki\u0107 is a team effort, and the Thunder did enough last year to advance. But when facing one of the best offensive players ever, expect a counterpunch to be thrown.<\/p>\n

Boston Celtics<\/p>\n

The Thunder are 3-0 during this five-game home stand, but that perfect record was nearly stripped from them against the Pistons on Monday night.<\/p>\n

Detroit was without its top-five scorers, and yet it took overtime for the Thunder to walk away with a four-point win. What did Detroit do to push the Thunder to the brink? Crash the offensive glass and generate second chances, two areas the Boston Celtics excel at.<\/p>\n

Both Detroit and Boston rank within the top five for\u00a0second-chance points<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0offensive-rebound rate<\/a>. \u00a0But punishing the Thunder on the glass isn\u2019t enough, as shown in Monday\u2019s narrow win.<\/p>\n

Which is why Boston is listed here instead of Detroit.<\/p>\n

Much like the Lakers, the Pistons, once Cade Cunningham returns, are over-reliant on one superstar\u2019s creation abilities. The Celtics, on the other hand, have multiple offensive pressure points to break down OKC\u2019s defense. And if Jayson Tatum\u2019s recent triple-double is any indication of what is to come, Boston will have its tier one creator back and ready for another Finals run.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The combination of second-chance opportunities and committee playmaking makes Boston a real threat to the Thunder — that is, if the latter can get past the two previously-mentioned behemoths.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Before Lakers star Luka Don\u010di\u0107 exited with a hamstring injury Thursday night, the OKC Thunder had just put…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":696756,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3783],"tags":[7,6,310,475,179,3966,3965,312],"class_list":{"0":"post-696755","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oklahoma-city-thunder","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-oklahoma","11":"tag-oklahoma-city","12":"tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","13":"tag-oklahomacity","14":"tag-oklahomacitythunder","15":"tag-thunder"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116343299313367806","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696755","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=696755"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696755\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/696756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=696755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=696755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=696755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}