u/Parallel-Quality

I watched the post-game presser so you don't have to. Here's a quick and dirty of the questions asked and Mark's answers:

Q: Your shots were leaning more towards the 3's

Mark:

-Thought the quality of our 3's in the first half was good

-Lucky to only be down 7 at half time

-Haven't played the Spurs in months, took a bit of adjusting

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Q: Dealing with Wemby in real time vs planning for him

Mark:

-He is great

-Need to learn a feel for him as you go

-Thunder did that back in December and got better against him as time went on

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Q: AC hitting everything, Spurs want him to shoot

Mark:

-He stepped up, incredible competitor

-Spurs were definitely funneling the ball to him

-He kept the Thunder in it

-We need more balance to our attack

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Q: Why did you sub out Isaiah so fast

Mark:

-It was always the plan to get Caruso in quickly

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Q: Shai's handling of the double team

Mark:

-We have to figure it out

-Spurs are good schematically

-We are good problem solvers

-We gotta solve some of these problems and be better in Game 2

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Q: Shai becoming more aggressive later in the game

Mark:

-We made some changes to get him some more looks as the game went on

-We have a lot that we can look at and improve on

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Q: AC guarding Wemby, why is it effective

Mark:

-Intelligence, instincts, competitiveness

-We defended well enough to win the game

-We lost the game on offense

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Q: J-Dub return from injury

Mark:

-He's on a soft minutes restriction

-Decided to rest him a bit in OT to decrease the risk

-J-Dub played great, especially in the first half, happy to have him back

-He does really intense workouts at the end of his rehab

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Q: Turnovers

Mark:

-Lots for us to learn from

-Need to acquire a taste for the opponent

-Spurs played a great game, deserved to win

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Q: Spurs not just limiting Shai but also Chet and Ajay

Mark:

-We have a lot of runway to improve. A lot of players can be better. We can be more intentional on the offensive end.

-We just need to rest, recover and get to work tomorrow.

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Q: Dylan Harper

Mark:

-We knew he was good. They have a great team, lots of talent.

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Q: Ajay's fast break 3

Mark:

-I don't like to micromanage individual possessions. We just need a couple more plays to go our way. There were 100+ of them in the game. I trust my guys to make the right play and be aggressive.

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Q: Caruso not starting 2OT

Mark:

-I often sub out to start OT to get fresh bodies in there and use our depth. He had played a lot of minutes, and they were hard minutes.

-I put him back in shortly after.

Mitchell played in the Thunder's 111-109 loss to the Spurs on December 13th.

He also played in the Thunder's 119-98 win against the Spurs on January 13th.

The 3 other losses? Ajay didn't play.

Now that people finally see how important Ajay is to the Thunder, is it crazy to say that missing Ajay was a big factor in why the Thunder went 1-4 against the Spurs in the regular season?