OKC Thunder Full Media Availability | Post Game at Detroit Pistons | January 28, 2024

OKC Thunder Full Media Availability | Post Game at Detroit Pistons | January 28, 2024

Jaylen it’s been a a long month a lot of time on the road um did you feel like you know some of that caught up to you guys today and uh you didn’t quite have the the juice that you normally have no I wouldn’t blame it on being on the road

Um just didn’t come to play uh early actually I thought we did come play Early um we looking at the game we actually did do a good job coming out kind of ready I think we just uh didn’t play as together as we could have um you

Know and that’s a very fixable thing so you know um there’s 882 wins and 82 losses on an NBA schedule so anybody can beat anybody any might can lose to anybody and uh we kind of took that for granted tonight I think you know played a little selfish and they they took

Advantage of that hit a lot of shots and you know so credit them they play really well and we didn’t their their offense has been a lot better this month um like 118 points a game were there any actions that you felt like they were getting to

Um like on a consistent basis that they were able to get um so much in the paint today uh I think they’re just figuring out um if you really look at their season they’ve been in a lot of close games so you know they’re not getting

Blown out every night as you know I think like the media kind of puts it out there but when you actually like really kind of do a deep dive into their games you know they’re losing games by three and four points you know by five some of

These games have been decided by you know one possession so you know they’re they’re learning how to play with each other and um I think everybody’s starting to understand their roles over here so you know they do a good job of just moving and cutting um playing within each other you know so

They do a good job of that and they’re still trying to figure it out and you know they did a good job tonight of kind of making the one more and you know moving the ball so you know hats off to them for that you mentioned getting out

To a strong start and then obviously they caught fire there in the second quarter what did you feel kind of changed between that that first and second quarter for you guys uh defensive intensity I think we kind of let off the gas a little bit and um you know then

They started hitting shots you know like any NBA team you know once you kind of give them confidence you know they they kind of took that and ran with it so um I think if we don’t have that breakdown you know they’re probably not as confident going into the game and then

You know they got comfortable and uh you know they’re NBA players so when you get comfortable it’s it’s hard to hard to kind of shut that off um knowing that this is a a team full of competitors just how much are you guys looking forward to the opportunity to to get

Back out there tomorrow and compete again after a game like this yeah it’s the beauty of the NBA you know you play again so um you got 100 more games so um yeah we’ll take this as a challenge kind of get the car back on the road uh just

Another opportunity to get better play with each other and you know kind of just uh flush this one and get ready for the next one so um you know lucky for us it’s you know like 12 hours away so anything you can learn from this game moving

Forward uh yeah you can learn a lot from wins and losses um you know I think just being ready to play the full 48 minutes of the game you know one one laps throughout a game no matter how many minutes it is I think can affect the

Total outcome of the game and you know for us it was that second quarter um you know they kind of kept rolling from there so if we can kind of cut that out I think we’d be in much better shape on the floor they were getting stronger as game went on Detroit

Yeah they were scoring yeah they were they were scoring at a pretty high rate um you know nobody wants to give up I think we gave up like 46 points in the second quarter that’s a lot of points um that’s almost half of what they scored

For the whole game so you know if we can eliminate that stretch I think we we would have had a better better opportunity to win the game had some energy early in that first quarter did anything happen that you saw in particular in that second quarter to to change things yeah I thought

Obviously we got off to a good start uh in the game and in the quarter and then um second quarter I just thought it was an energy thing uh in both ways I give them a lot of credit they play with great energy they beat us to balls play

With great intensity uh as the game were on they got um more and more energy and we just couldn’t drum it up so obviously they deserve to win today uh so credit them seemed like you tried to push a lot of different energy buttons throughout

The course of the game um is it one of those things that just once a team like that or you know any NBA team gets rolling uh it’s hard to to slow that down yeah I mean it’s a 48-minute game I mean we obviously thought um we had our

Chances you know and tried to get it going uh at different parts of the game but again give them credit I thought they brought uh very consistent energy in that game especially from the second quarter on and we just had a hard time getting back into it but the way they

Were shooting shooting the ball what did you see from the looks they were able to get and how much of that do you feel like was controllable for for you guys tonight uh there was plenty that was controllable we obviously could have played better but uh I also don’t want

To take anything away from the way that they played I mean they’ve obviously had a tough season uh and they brought the juice today you know and they outplayed us on this day and so uh you know credit to them and the way that they played The

Energy they brought they deserve to win the game how much did did you feel like Pace played a factor and just the the looks that they were able to get throughout the night for them um yeah I thought I they were sharp uh I thought

We were sharp you know at times in the first half obviously uh to build the lead that we did um but again you know I thought you know we just did we were a step slow today for whatever reason uh and they were on it you know and they

Played yesterday they they brought the juice today I thought you know again they deserve credit for the win Detroit attacked the paint tremendously there in the second quarter I think they scored 46 points in that quarter what were they doing and why was it so difficult for you guys to defend

Them yeah I mean they were downhill with great force um you know usually that’s the strength of our defense I mean we’ve obviously had a good defense for much of the year so um a little bit uncharacteristic in that quarter for us and combination of that with uh the

Force they played with and the way they attacked get a chance to go home immediately tomorrow just how much do you feel like these guys are looking forward to the opportunity to just like get back out there and compete after an at like yeah I mean you never feel good

After a game like that so it’s the best thing about the NBA schedule is it keeps turning and tomorrow’s a new opportunity obviously a big challenge for us tomorrow against a team that uh we just beat on the road uh and that we’ve played a bunch of times already this

Year so uh we got to throw our best punch in that game we got to you know move past this one learn learn what we can from it but then move past it get ready to play tomorrow you catch a break with this game being moved up due the

Detroit playing later today how does that help you guys kind of get in and earlier as opposed to one of those 1 a.m. you know returns yeah we’d prefer it we’d prefer it but um you know we’ve we’ve had a tough schedule and you know we got to be pros and get ourselves

Ready for the game regardless of what time we get in uh and the game tomorrow is going to require you know a high high level of energy if we want to win it so uh we got to find a way to drum that up and then go out there and throw our best

Punch do you think of playing Shay all there in the fourth cuz he looked up at the bench like five minutes too and then you know you know yeah I mean kicked it around I think it’s always a balance um you know I if I thought thought uh we

Had what we needed to to get back in the game then I obviously would have done it but with the way the game was going I just didn’t feel it and with the schedule we’ve had leading into this and the schedule we have coming out of it I

Thought it was wise to to just let those guys play

Hear from Jalen Williams and Head Coach Mark Daigneault following the Thunder’s loss in Detroit.

0:00 Jalen Williams
3:32 Coach Daigneault

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