OKC Thunder Full Media Availability | Post Game vs Portland Trail Blazers | January 11, 2024

OKC Thunder Full Media Availability | Post Game vs Portland Trail Blazers | January 11, 2024

Hey Gallow KY Thunder uh sh you guys didn’t look like a team that got in at 3 o’ in the morning last night uh why do you think that was um we didn’t like the way we played off our last backtack um we wanted to make an emphasis to come

Out here and and kind of play from the jump um be ready to go from the jump and I think we did so any catalysts in those opening few moments that you know 5 10 minutes of the game that you felt like were um kind of affirmations of that approach

Um not that I can think of but I just think we were on our PS and our Q’s from from from jump ball um on both ends of the floor and then um you know guys like oze and Trey who uh haven’t played a ton of minutes Mark says you know those guys

Are much better players than they were a year ago at this time what are you seeing behind the scenes from some of these guys that haven’t gotten extended minutes U but but clearly are have taken steps yeah um they’re in the the toughest spot of the NBA um you have talent you have

Skill um and you’re just not getting the opportunity you’d like um and for those guys to to come in every day keep good spirits work just as hard um it’s a it’s a a blessing and honor to be around those guys just because they could very

Easily be the other way um and nobody would blame them um and in terms of on in the court they uh they attack the program they want to get better every day they do so um and we do that across the board um whether guys are playing or

Not and I think we’re uh we’re seeing the repercussions of it Shay tonight uh Josh played really well triple double 13 12 and 10 A lot’s been talked about of just his recent struggles and I know you’ve mentioned before how important he is to your guys’ offense just getting

The ball moving and things like that it seems like it’s easy sometimes for people will talk about when he’s not playing well but in games like this can you just talk about the importance of his game to your guys’ team and Flo yeah um Josh is an uh Elite passer um very

High IQ basketball player um obviously huge for his position when he um is making the decisions um and when he’s aggressive um he’s a really good basketball player and now when he’s making shots he just gets a whole lot better um and he went through a little bit of

Slump obviously um and he’s worked at it and got better from it that’s all you can ask just someone to recognize look in the mirror and get better from it and that’s how you grow as a player um we’re seeing that unfold in front of our

Us J Martinez and Shay looking back a few years ago to that that blowout loss to Memphis the record setting one to to where you guys are at right now just how much of a learning moment was that that game for you guys and what have you seen

Out of the group in terms of the strides over the years since then yeah um we’ve obviously come a long way from that day uh I don’t remember too much about it um I unfortunately wasn’t playing um but I remember like it it was embarrassing and

It did I did feel bad just because I wasn’t out there with them um but yeah we uh we after that after that game we addressed it um and we just we just made a promise to ourselves to never feel that feeling again um I think it’s been

A little bit of our fuel um to get to where we are today yeah sh you uh you haven’t really risen much in the in the Allstar voting but your MVP stock seems to be going through the roof does one matter to you more than more than the other I would uh

MVP for sure any else got you all in the front then Dean in the back we go Dean first that’s fine um Shay it sure seemed like it was a night that you know you guys could have just jacked shots up and you’re going to roll these guys anyway but it

Looked like you were you and your teammates went out of your way to uh pass the basketball some of the assists were just incredible but just wondered about the unselfishness and how much fun it is how big a deal it is to you guys to play that way that

Unselfishly yeah um one of the big thing one of the big things coach was Haring on was just playing to our identity um and not building bad habits no matter the score um and like you said it’s easy to kind of lose sight of what we’re

Supposed to be doing because we’re up so much um but coming out of half we wanted to make sure sure that we were still doubling down on the things that we’re good at um and trying to create better habits and not build any bad ones going forward obviously the mid-range pull-up

Isn’t new to you I think last year was the first year you really started shooting like a crazy amount of them and now this year you’re shooting the same amount of attempts but you’re just hitting them at higher right I just wonder what’s going into the process and

Of getting that shot and and you know finding a better Rhythm this year um I just work at it um I’ve had more I I don’t think it’s I don’t think it’s anything different than just me having more time to work on it um I’ve had a year of shooting them a

Year under my belt year being comfortable in that position um and getting to my spots go ahead you struggled a little bit at the line for by your standard lot bit on the road trip did you look at anything did you anything strike you about the way you shot um

I was frustrated with it for sure um I’ve tried to just not harp on it too much uh it’s annoying though for sure but I just tried to tonight just clear my mind and Sho free thros last one one more uh you you were part of that you didn’t play but you

Were part of that blowout two years ago played tonight do you ever have empathy for the other team when you’re up when you guys were up 60 whatever points at some point is there room for empathy in the NBA um yeah there is um it it’s we’ve been in a position and

We didn’t like the feeling um and you don’t take a win for granted but you can win by 30 or 40 um without winning by 70 now I’m not mad for anybody for for doing so um but yeah it is uh it’s not a fun feeling for sure at

All hey G see thunder uh Chad Shay said that uh you all didn’t like the way you played in Atlanta the last time you had a backtack uh how present was um you know maybe being able to take take a step forward in that specific regard uh

How present was that in yall’s mind heading into the game uh very present um you know we’re trying to learn from all of our experiences and um we’ve had uh good outcomes out of back-to-backs and bad outcomes and uh we wanted to learn from both and apply it to tonight and I feel

Like we did a good job of that you’ve talked about Mark’s talked about the way that you’ve uh you know taken care of your body throughout the course of the season um what was your day like today getting in late and getting yourself physically mentally emotionally prepared to to give it

Everything to me um uh it was kind of going through my my regular routine um obviously there’s a little more fatigue with uh the travel and just playing yesterday on the road and all that um but mentally most of it was just kind of like getting to the point where it kind

Of clicked like we play tonight um cuz before this season I’ve never played two days in a row like an actual game two days in a row so just kind of like getting used to that I guess um and then um going through all my regular preparation uh mentally to get ready for

The game you said you want to take something from every one of your experiences and I think some people would say like when you win by 62 like what can you take from it but what what could you guys take away from this uh I mean we didn’t

Play a perfect game um we had a lot of really good moments but there’s still things we can learn from tonight um as well as um learning from uh you know outcomes and uh tonight I feel like we um really did a good job of playing our

Brand of basketball and um you know when you you have a good outcome uh it really reinforces why why you want to stick to that um you know sometimes when you know you lose games or go through rough stretches you you can kind of stray from your identity and um you know it’s

Always good to have uh reinforcing games to kind of remind you why why you play how you play and um I feel like tonight was one of those games do you have an eye on what’s behind us here and is there anything riding on that for

You um yeah I was just kind of I wasn’t staring into space I was watching the game on the TV um yeah uh if I got time I’ll or if I get home soon enough I’ll catch the end of it um but no I don’t have any bets or

Anything on no not not a a gambling guy Chad on Wednesday it looks like it’ll be the first time you and pal match up with each other since College what level of excitement do you have for that one whenever you guys had like an incredible duel back when you were in

Kinaga versus Duke uh uh yeah just like um I mean you don’t want to say any other night in the NBA but um you know that’s what the NBA is about playing against really good players and and um you know he’s another one of those um

That we’ve been seeing all season and um you know he’s playing really well right now um so we got a uh really game plan for the for the magic and get ready to play them and um do our best to come out with a win uh and they’re going to do

The same thing um but it’s always great to uh play against guys not only Paulo but uh you know my guy Jaylen out there um you know play against guys that you’ve known for a long time um you know it’s sometimes almost more competitive uh you know just cuz uh there’s that

Relationship there and um you know it’s going to be fun then following up on that you mentioned guys you played against and with for a long time what’s that sort of like to play guys in the NBA who you’ve played like all throughout your teenage years like is

That something you guys talked about just like oh when we get to the NBA we’re going to play against each other or is this all just still kind of odd to think about no uh I mean it’s definitely crazy um uh me and Jaylen haven’t played on

The same court together in like three years uh in an actual game so you know it’s been a while um it’ll definitely be exciting and uh you know we didn’t talk about playing against each other um like the first argument or not even argument but first conversation I remember was

Uh me Jaylen and another one of our buddies uh when we were like really young like arguing on who had a better chance to go to the NBA uh and he was really good back then and I wasn’t so good but um you everybody knew I was

Going to be super tall so like they were trying to say it’ be me and I was trying to say I was trying to say it’ be him and uh I guess we both made it so it’s pretty cool U full uh full circle moment

For sure um you know it’s going to be going to be a fun match up CH I don’t I don’t know we saw it a ton night because obviously you guys down stret didn’t play a ton um but but yesterday in Miami we we didn’t really get to ask you um

Just your connection with dub was was on full display and and Mark has talked at length about you know all this going into that that the minutes weren’t always super fruitful this year um but to get to this point with dub like I’m just curious what you learn about you

Know what he likes what what he doesn’t like you know what makes him tick those those sort of things to build that connection uh I mean it it wasn’t perfect uh right away and um even if it was perfect there were still going to be things that we had to

Learn learn from and uh you know I feel like we did a really good job of understanding uh what we had to learn on and then you know applying it and uh you know we’re we’re having success right now and um that’s great um but you know

It’s not an easy thing in the NBA to sustain success forever and not have any hiccups and um you know we’re not expecting that there’s going to be more bumps down the road so we just got to continue to learn and get better in those in those situations and um you

Know it’s it’s exciting to see the growth for sure uh but we got a long ways to go you being a lob thre isn’t anything new but I just wonder at this level in terms of positioning just all the nuances to go into it what you found Works in terms of making yourself

Available for those sort of things uh yeah I mean the the way to exploit certain coverages is um pretty similar from college to NBA uh obviously different players different level of athletes on the floor um different kind of style of game but uh the principles are pretty similar um you know it’s just

Kind of everybody getting on the same page and getting the Reps together to um kind of like I said learn from those situations you got a favorite lob thrower on this team uh no I don’t pick favorites I appreciate them all equally uh CH just thinking about this

Santa Clair Gonzaga game you you played against J in college what about his play in the NBA has surprised you so far you know getting to play against him a few years ago and then to now um nothing I knew he was a good player before the draft um before we ended up

Being teammates uh you know he uh looked like a really good player when we’re playing against him um so like I’m not surprised at all by what he’s doing um you know I see the work that he puts in and um you know that that work is

Fruitful and it’ll continue to be you’re top 10 in fan voting right now for the All-Star game but last year you had four players vote for you for the All-Star Game did you ever find out who those players were no I don’t know if they were I’m assuming they were

Teammates but then again I don’t know so I hopefully I get more than four this year you have any lean of who it could have been could have been anybody honestly yeah I don’t know hey Gallow KC Thunder uh Mark just from the way that you guys came out of

The gates did you feel like this was a a step forward after a long travel night uh from maybe the long travel night you had going into Atlanta was that um you know kind of crossing your mind as as you guys responded the way you did to

The the start of this one yeah I thought we cleared a couple hurdles tonight I thought the first one was the start of the game and how ready we were to play and the energy we were able to generate uh you know obviously with a tough

Schedule um which is a is a step forward it’s mind over matter and then the other hurdle was playing with a lead you know I thought we were able to build obviously a pretty good lead and I thought we played pretty well with a lead both ends of the floor um which

We’ve had leads in the past we’ve done that well we’ve done that poorly at different times and those were the two challenges that we had uh before and in the game tonight I thought the guys did a great job there you often talk about guys Jay Dub’s just effort level he had

A couple plays I think long rebounds that he Tracked Down in like the first two or three minutes do you feel those plays as being kind of catalyzers for you know a team in a night like this yeah those are huge and I think you know

When you’re on the second night of a back toback or you know in a condensed travel uh situation like beating the other team to the ball you know is a is a good start you know something simple as that you know that’s a a tangible way

To express energy is like just get to the ball you know force yourself to get to the ball that was a challenge that we laid out before the game and again the guys did a really good job of that especially early Mark you talk about playing with the lead and I think the

Thing that on the second night of a back toback when you come out in that second half I think that’s a place where sometimes a game could get away not get away from you in terms of losing a lead but just Lo yeah did you like that you

Didn’t see a ton of that there in the third quarter yeah that was the challenge coming out of halftime obviously not playing the scoreboard um and having the maturity to understand that no minute uh should go wasted you know we’re building habits regardless of the circumstances uh and that group did

A really good job they knew they weren’t going to be out there very long uh and were challenged to play the right way and they did it’s also shot shot really well from the free throw line which had not been the case as much on the road trip is there anything there anything

Consistent there that you saw like free throw shooting yeah like when you guys were struggling there on the road I have no idea yeah I I know I mean just presence you know I it’s I don’t coach that so among a lot of other things I don’t coach like

Basketball andw with the athletic now coach the team with the largest margin of defeat in Thunder history in the largest margin of Victory like can you tell me like what the the journey has been from there to here for you um that was an important game for us

So I thought we learned a lot of lessons in that game you know um we learn you learn that it’s one game you know it’s a true zero and zero thing when you come out of that thing uh you learn that the sun comes up the next day you have

Practice the next day um you know I think in competition competition’s hard and um fear is something that uh is an emotion that you feel in competition and uh that’s like your worst nightmare that game you know but the uh the image of it

Or the the fear of it is worse than the reality of it the reality of it is you lose the game you taste your own blood and then you wake up the next day and you’re zero and zero you got practice you got another game coming uh so we

Learned a lot from that I thought um it it built some good uh fortitude in the team and and some good scars U to the point where now it’s kind of a badge of honor we don’t talk about it um but I mean we we endured obviously a lot of

Struggle uh and that brings Integrity to Future experiences and uh we’re probably better not only with that game but we’re probably better because of the struggles we’ve endured and we’ll endure more struggles and and we’ll be be better because of those if we handle them the same way else we

Got Michael Cliff over there you know following up on Andrew’s question like mentioning that going from the largest margin of losing to biggest winning was there any thought of like chasing that record from you guys that’s our record we weren’t chasing that coach which one of these impresses

You means more to you the 139 or the 77 allow I mean the the there’s always noise in the in the score of an individual game there’s shot making noise I thought they missed shots uh early you know um I thought they missed shots in the third like they had some

Decent looks that they missed they’re in the midst of a road trip uh we saw them in New York we were staying at the same Hotel um so I mean they’re they’re on the road they’re down a couple guys um so it’s hard to evaluate the 77 just

Like you know we played Washington the air night and I thought we drummed up pretty good energy in that game and they shot the hell out of the ball and the defensive output on paper didn’t look great but I actually thought we turned a corner in terms of effort uh in that

Game and so um proud of the way that we handled the challenges tonight like I mentioned at the beginning you know being ready to play you know we cleared that hurdle playing with the lead we cleared that one what the score ends up being you know is just one

Game Marcus this kind of a sign of of this team I mean it was a a night where I mean I think you had 40 assists again it just seemed like the guys were trying to one up each other with terrific assists I thought some of the bounce passes were tremendous yeah I

Think you know if you look at some of the best uh assists that we have as a team there’s always like a setup pass you know that it’s an advanced pass or it’s a ball reversal um that’s an invisible pass you know doesn’t count

For an assist it doesn’t um show up in a box score but uh those are the passes were most proud of because they’re sacrificial in nature you truly are playing the game and and um playing for the team when you make those plays and the group’s done a great job for a long

Stretch of time now of making those types of plays we’re not perfect on a given possession but um we’ve got kind of a contagiousness around that right now and it’s making us very difficult to guard and uh I think the guys are gaining confidence uh and momentum from that

Offensively yeah Mark chony bips just called you guys an elite team do you agreee with that and second of all the leap you’ve made two years ago to last year was significant now you’re making a similar significant leap which seemed like very difficult thing to do to

Improve that much two straight years how difficult is that and did you see that coming I have no expectations um so I didn’t see it coming I didn’t not see it coming I just I didn’t have an expectation for it um and I I really honestly I think you know it’s all about

Stacking it’s all about you know you know stacking days stacking reps stacking possessions stacking games stacking weeks um and being very present in that process uh and just giving your all to every single rep day possession game um and just seeing where that lands you and if you commit to that process

Which our team’s done a very good job of for not only this year but for a long time um you’re going to be you’re going to end up where you’re supposed to be and wherever that lands us we’ll be able to put our head on the pillow at night I

Don’t know um What description that lands us you know we’re we’re just going to do our best every single day we’re going to stack possessions again on Saturday stack games uh and let that win the day and wherever we end up we end up I that’s honestly how I look at it not

To punt on your question Deontay is playing this third straight game you’ve done that before with Trey man what goes into that decision making to kind of push a guy to play three in a row yeah it’s tough you know and he ended up playing more than I would have expected

Obviously um but we we dressed him for that reason on a back toback you never know what’s going to happen um and wanted him him to be available he’s I give him a lot of credit because um he’s just been parked you know with the g-league uh he’s done a great job with

His development plan um you know hasn’t gotten an NBA minute really yet other than the preseason you know when we call him today and tell him that he’s active and he’s like grateful for the opportunity you know and plays like it so um I have a lot of respect for how

He’s handled himself up until this point he’s gotten better as a result of that approach uh he’s just got a great you know Spirit of humility and and hard work you know he’s a blue collar guy player um and he’s done a great job so

Far I was happy to see him out there you mention you know coach free throws how do you divvy up the responsibilities among your staff with free throws no it’s just everything in basketball in life um it’s a loaded question but they they have

Work to do every day when they show up I mean they got stuff to do the only one that’s fake it there’s one person faking it and I’m not going to tell you who that is

Hear from Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Chet Holmgren, and Head Coach Mark Daigneault following the Thunder’s 139 – 77 win over the Trail Blazers.

0:00 Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
7:00 Chet Holmgren
15:10 Coach Daigneault

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