Good morning. Let’s basketball.
Kevin Durant’s old buds visited. He was an awful host
Good morning. We have that and more in Friday’s NBA newsletter.
Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports
WELL, THAT HAPPENED: As the cold war between Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook reached a fever pitch thanks to the latter’s decision to wear a photographer’s vest to the game (yes really), KD and the Warriors came out and destroyed the Thunder. Durant scored 39 on 15-24 shooting and hit seven threes. Westbrook shot 4-15 for 20 points with six turnovers. The Thunder were on a road back-to-back after beating the Clippers on Wednesday, but ... yeah, Golden State is damn fierce.
The most exciting parts of the game came during the second quarter, when KD and Westbrook traded vicious blocks and Enes Kanter tried to trash talk Durant from the bench. KD got the last word in the post-game. And, well, on the scoreboard.
BACK IN OKLAHOMA: Tim Cato had a good piece on what people in Oklahoma City were saying about Durant in the preseason, after having the summer to internalize his exit.
IT’S NOT YOU, IT’S ME: Ben Cohen on how to handle a breakup, starring Westbrook and Durant.
WE HAVE AN ANSWER: On Thursday, 538 asked in a headline if the Warriors can break basketball again. Benjamin Morris concluded that yes, they can. The Thursday night game did nothing to dispel that.
NOT ALL IS LOST: But hey man, at least new Thundarian Jerami Grant cranked that biz on Durant before the game became a blowout.
SPEAKING OF CRANKING THAT BIZ ... Good god almighty, Tristan Thompson. You gotta send Tyler Zeller some flowers or something.
ONE-DEFEATED: With OKC’s loss, there’s just one undefeated team remaining in the NBA: your defending champion Cleveland Cavaliers. They beat the Celtics in a shootout to improve to 5-0. This is uncharted territory for LeBron, whose teams had never won more than three games in a row to start a season before.
JUST DEFEATED: Meanwhile, we have four winless teams still: the 76ers, Mavericks, Pelicans and Wizards. Sad.
SCORES GALORE ...
Kings 94, Magic 102
Pacers 107, Bucks 125
Nuggets 102, Wolves 99
Celtics 122, Cavaliers 128
Thunder 96, Warriors 122
GRAB THE MIC: The NBA will hold an awards show at season’s end, where MVP and other trophies will be handed out. Here is the exclusive list of all potential hosts the NBA is considering asking to emcee the event.
AREA 21: This is going to be a treat: Kevin Garnett and Rasheed Wallace hanging out, talking about basketball during TNT broadcasts, testing the bleep button.
FREE THE BOSNIAN BEAR: Zach Lowe loves what Jusuf Nurkic is doing this season (and more).
FIRE NORMAN DALE: Nice Vulture interview of Hoosiers director David Anspaugh by David Marchese. The main takeaway is that Gene Hackman, who played coach Norman Dale, was a jerk. GO FIGURE. (Have I mentioned lately that I really dislike Hoosiers?)
UM, ALRIGHT: Woj reports that as Jerry Colangelo steps down as chairman of USA Basketball, retired Gen. Martin Dempsey, a former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will be elected to take over. Colangelo will continue to be, effectively, the GM of the U.S. men’s national team. Gen. Dempsey has most recently led the NBA’s youth initiative as an adviser to Adam Silver. It’s cool that this move will strengthen USA Basketball’s ties to youth basketball throughout the country. And Gen. Dempsey is certainly overqualified from a leadership and administrative perspective. But you’d think these types of gigs would go to basketball lifers. It has the feel of when universities hire former corporate CEOs instead of lifelong academics as provosts. Sure, universities need leaders with business acumen because they are giant businesses. But there’s often a disconnect in practice. I trust Gen. Dempsey will navigate the gap just fine, especially with Colangelo sticking around and fellow military man Gregg Popovich become the face of the team.
HERE COMES LEBRON: Kevin Pelton on LeBron’s chances of catching Kareem and becoming the all-time leading NBA scorer.
NEXT UP: The Friday ESPN doubleheader features Knicks-Bulls (8 p.m. ET) in Derrick Rose’s return to Chicago and Warriors-Lakers (10:30). League Pass Game of the Night is definitely the Spurs-Jazz revenge match (9 p.m.).
On Saturday, NBA TV has Clippers-Spurs at 8:30 p.m. ET. There are a couple of potential League Pass gems, too: Wolves-Thunder at 6 p.m. and Rockets-Hawks at 7:30.
NBA TV has another game on Sunday — Bucks-Mavericks at 7 p.m. ET. Slim pickings on League Pass, too, though Blazers-Grizzlies in the late afternoon (3:30 p.m. ET) will get the job done.
Happy Friday. Be excellent to each other.
See More:
