The Thunder lost by 18 in this one, but a lot of Thunder players performed very well in this one. It wasn’t a total loss if one thinks about it that way. There were some surprising explosions from a couple of people, and it was because the silly season is underway in OKC. This is the Thunder vs. Hawks recap.
Now, this was a surprising explosion if anyone’s ever seen one. Waters hit a career-high 9/15 shots (including seven threes) for a career-high 25 points, four boards, one assist and one steal. Waters has been a fun three-point shooting prospect for this club and over the last week, he has been averaging 17 points, 3.3 rebounds, 2.3 assists, 1.3 steals, two turnovers and five threes a game on 47% from the field. A silly season dynamo, Waters is going to continue getting burn in this rotation and produce some fun offensive numbers with good steals.
Roby has been producing some nice numbers including a 30 bomb against Portland the other day. This time, he put up 14 points nine boards, two dimes, one block and two turnovers on 6/14 from the field, 2/6 from the line and 0/2 from three. The shooting wasn’t there tonight. but he still put up a nice line. Roby has been so good for this tanking club lately, as he’s putting up averages of 18.7 points, eight boards, three dimes, 0.7 steals, 1.7 blocks and 1.3 threes a game over the last week. Roby is another silly season master and his recent string of games is proof. He’s going to continue getting minutes as the starting center for this club.
Sarr had a good game off the bench this time. He had 17 points, nine boards, two assists and a swat on 6/9 from the line, 1/3 from three and 4/4 from the line. Sarr has been producing nicely as the backup center, averaging 11.3 points, 5.3 boards, 1.3 assists, 0.7 steals, 0.3 blocks, 1.3 turnovers, and 0.7 threes on 65% from the field and 86% from the line. The young center is a cool prospect for this club but it remains to be seen if he stays with this club beyond this season. Maybe he will, but he’ll probably play a ton in the G-League.
The second-year player put up 18 points, four rebounds, eight assists, one steal, and four turnovers on 8/14 from the field, 1/3 from three and 1/1 from the line. This team is going to be full of surprises over the next couple weeks as the season comes to an end. Maledon is one of those surprises. He wasn’t in the rotation earlier on in the season, but lately he’s been making a lot of noise. Over the last two weeks, Maledon has been putting up averages of 14.7 points, 1.6 threes, 4.6 boards, 4.1 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.6 blocks, and 2.9 turnovers on 49% from the field and 83% from the line. Maledon was a very promising rookie prospect last season, but this season he didn’t really get the same opportunity until now. Now that he has, he hasn’t been disappointed at all.
