Abrines day-to-day, won’t travel
Thunder coach Billy
Donovan said Doug McDermott would probably get in the game earlier against Memphis on Thursday and he wasn’t kidding in the Thunder’s 103-101 win.
McDermott had an opportunity to shine in Alex
Abrines’ absence (left knee sprain). What neither Donovan nor McDermott expected was for Andre Roberson to be ruled out after halftime with left knee soreness.
McDermott finished with 10 points and seven rebounds in 32 minutes, including two key 3-pointers in the fourth quarter.
McDermott’s typically been a second-quarter rotation player, but was the first Thunder player off the bench at the first stoppage at 5:58. Then, he received the start in the third quarter with Roberson back in the locker room. While Russell Westbrook was seeking his ninth-consecutive tripledouble, McDermott was helping extend the Thunder’s lead to double digits. Westbrook dribbled left on a screen midway through the third quarter and flipped back to McDermott, whose 3-pointer gave the Thunder a 67-57 lead.
It wasn’t a perfect start. Two minutes into his firstquarter shift, McDermott drew a foul shooting a 3-pointer. The 84.8 career free throw shooter missed his first two, after the second giving a perplexed look.
What more perplexing for the Thunder is what its defense will look like should Roberson miss significant time. Roberson also sat out a game in preseason with left knee soreness.
Abrines day-to-day, doesn’t make trip
It appears the Thunder dodged a bullet in regard to Abrines’ left knee.
The rookie guard is day-to-day for the Thunder’s four-game road trip which heads to Phoenix on Friday. Abrines didn’t travel with the team to Memphis after an MRI confirmed the 23-year-old suffered a knee sprain against Milwaukee on Tuesday.
While the play it happened on looked ugly in Thunder’s 110-79 win Tuesday, Donovan said the team “probably escaped a little bit” in regard to the severity of Abrines’ injury.
Donovan said there’s no timetable for Abrines return. It’s a possibility he could rejoin the Thunder on its road trip. But it’s not expected to be a Kevin Durant-esque layoff. The former Thunder forward was diagnosed with an MCL sprain and bone bruise after a player fell into his left knee in Golden State’s Feb. 28 game against Washington. Durant has missed 18 games since.
“It could have sidelined him for a while, but we certainly don’t feel like that’s the case,” Donovan said of Abrines.
Abrines was having his most efficient shooting game in nearly a month (12 points on 4-of-6 from 3-point range) when Milwaukee’s Khris Middleton fell into his left leg while diving for a loose ball. The Thunder’s No. 2 3-point shooter at 37.2 percent has already missed four games this season due to back spasms.
Even more critical is his history of knee injuries.
During the 2016 Summer Olympics where he represented Spain, Abrines was sideline for a game for precautionary reasons, what the Spanish Basketball Federation referred to as “discomfort” in his left knee. Dating back to 2013, Abrines had a bout with patellar tendonitis in his right knee and missed two weeks of FC Barcelona’s season after tweaking his right knee in 2015.
Tip-ins
With a triple-double against Phoenix on Friday, Westbrook will have three against the Suns this season. Semaj Christon made another buzzer-beater, this one coming at the end of the first quarter. It was his third of the season. … Westbrook has 11 tripledouble with 40 points or more, the most in the NBA dating back to the 1983-84 season.