OKC looking for ‘team effort’ vs. Pelicans’ Cousins, Davis
The 3-point shooting, balldistributing center is here to stay. DeMarcus Cousins is at the front of the revolution.
On Monday, the Thunder gets its first look this season at center shooting 7.3 3-pointers a game this season and dishing out 5.6 assists per game, both tops at the position in the NBA. Cousins also is fourth overall in rebounding (13.2), fifth in points (27.1) and first in double-doubles (13).
“You’ve got Cousins down there and Anthony Davis.
They’re 60 points, damn near 40 rebounds a night,” Thunder forward Carmelo
Anthony said. Cousins and Davis are actually averaging a combined 52.2 points and 24.2 rebounds per game. “For myself and Steven
(Adams), it’s going to be a team effort game on the defensive end. We’ve got to do a great job defensively as a team to stop those guys.”
Paul George defended Davis in preseason, so the versatile small forward will spend time on the Pelicans All-Star. Davis is expected to play after suffering a concussion Friday against Denver.
The biggest challenge will be for Adams, who will be drawn out of the paint to defend Cousins, who even acts as a trailer on the fast break who stops at the 3-point line instead of running to the rim.
“The game’s changed in a lot of ways, where you’ve got a guy like Cousins that’ll trail and shoot threes,” Thunder coach Billy Donovan said. “The habit or the natural tendency for a big is to kind of get back and get to the free-throw line area and try to help on penetration.
“With Cousins trailing, you’re gonna have to know where he’s at and be able to get out there to him.”
Where it puts the Thunder at a disadvantage is on the defensive rebounds. The Thunder is already 28th in the NBA in defensive rebounds (31.5 per game), and Adams will be out on the perimeter more that a typical night. But long rebounds off Cousins 3-point attempts means more opportunities for George and Russell Westbrook to chase down loose balls. George (27) and Westbrook (21) are first and seventh in the league, respectively, in loose balls recovered, per nba.com/stats.
“It does take Steven out of rebounding position when he does shoot the ball, and it does require the other four guys to rebound,” Donovan said. “And most of the time when (Cousins is) taking those shots, they’re gonna be long rebounds. So, we’ve all got to contribute and help in the rebounding department.”
No more Orlando Summer League
The Thunder will be looking for a new summer league home.
According to an Orlando Sentinel report, the Orlando Magic will not have its annual summer league in July 2018, instead opting to play in the NBA Summer League in Las Vegas. The Thunder has participated in the Orlando Summer League every offseason since it moved to Oklahoma City in 2008.
The Thunder hasn’t made a decision on where it will play this upcoming summer, The Oklahoman learned Sunday. Typically, the franchise doesn’t start discussing the summer league until spring.
The Orlando Sentinel’s report stated that NBA officials prefer to have all 30 teams participate in its Las Vegas Summer League, but eight teams played in the Orlando league last summer, including the Thunder. Of the eight teams that played in Orlando last summer — Oklahoma City, Charlotte, Indiana, Miami, the New York Knicks, Detroit and Orlando — only one (Dallas) also sent a team to Las Vegas Summer League.
Other options could emerge. The Utah Jazz also has its own summer league which plays games before the start of Las Vegas Summer League. The Jazz’s summer league was a sixgame, four-team event at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. All of the teams that participated in the Utah league, however, also played in Las Vegas last offseason.