Thunder Must Try Their Luck in Vegas

Lucky or not here they come...

The Oklahoma City Thunder are a very good basketball team.

Since Isaiah Hartenstein has returned from his early season finger injury the Thunder have recorded a 7 – 1 record. Interestingly the Thunder have recorded this record with some astounding advanced metrics – specifically the team has the best defense in the league per Cleaning The Glass, which eliminates garbage time.

Since November 20 (when Hartenstein returned), OKC has been the best team in the league in terms of point differential at +12.1, a full point and a half ahead of Boston.

While Boston continues to operate at a near historic level of offensive efficiency, OKC is getting the job done with defense. OKC’s defense is 7.4 points per 100 possessions better than league average over this stretch – giving up 104.6 points per 100 possessions.

This is 2.2 points per 100 possessions better than the #2 ranked defense, Houston, which is at 106.8 points per 100 possessions.

Naturally the run the team is on has attracted national attention. Some media members have thrown out the phrase ‘historic’ or ‘best defense by a landslide’.

So how is OKC putting up such ridiculous defensive stats?

Since Hartenstein returned from injury on 11/20/2024, the Thunder have had an average-ish defense on 2s in terms of shooting percentage allowed per Cleaning The Glass. Defensively, the Thunder are below average at the rim, below average at Short Mid shots (4 to 14 feet from the basket) and above average at Long Mid shots (14+ feet to the 3 point line).

The Thunder are even below average at Corner 3s allowed at 39.5% vs. the league average of 39.0% over this recent run.

One number above all stands out. The Thunder are allowing 29.1% opponent shooting accuracy on above the break 3 pointers!

Since above the break 3s represent a large portion of overall 3 point attempts, on a combined basis the Thunder are allowing only 32.1% on opponent 3 point attempts. This ranks second to Memphis and is well below league average over this recent stretch.

Not allowing the opponent to make 3 pointers is important! How are the Thunder doing it?

A wise man once said, “It’s better to be lucky than good.”

Well in this case OKC is both. The Thunder have benefited from some tremendous opponent shooting luck from 3 over this stretch.

Specifically, the team is giving up a ton of Open (no defender within 4-6 feet) 3 pointers and the opponents simply aren’t making shots.

Nearly 20% of the shots OKC gives up are open 3s and the opponent is hitting less than 28% of these attempts! See the outliers in the bottom right of the chart – OKC and PHI.

League average is 34% for Open 3 pointers this season. OKC is due for negative shooting regression as it’s not like OKC is giving up Open 3’s to non-shooters – using historical Open 3 shooting metrics for each player, the expected make rate for the players who were open vs. OKC since Hartenstein returned is 34.3% - so slightly above league average.

What does an Open shot look like? It’s usually a contest but the shooter has a good look at the basket. Here are examples.

What’s better than Open Shots? Wide Open shots.

Since Hartenstein returned, no one has given up more Open + Wide Open 3 point shots and conceded a lower shooting percentage than OKC.

They aren’t the only team getting lucky, but they are the only team getting THIS lucky.

OKC remains a strong defense despite the Open 3 point shooting luck. However, even for a good defense, OKC is running hot on tightly defended opponent 3 point shooting (this means a defender is between 2-4 feet of the shooter). Shots like this:

Reaves can make that shot, but didn’t that time.

OKC is truly an outlier in terms of the number of tightly contested 3s (that’s a good thing!), allowing only 20% makes (since Hartenstein returned). League average is 28.5% allowed so surely there is some regression coming for OKC.

Long story short, don’t take defensive numbers at face value. The Thunder are an outstanding defense – but they are running hot on opponent shooting luck and are due for negative regression. Hopefully for OKC regression comes after they try their luck today and if they win, in Vegas this weekend.