Playoffs recap for May 3rd 2012: Durant fires back at LeBron
Dre here. I didn’t get Arturo the data for generating his nightly update in time. I’ll take the reigns for today. I’ve decided to break this into game by game so to start let’s go over the marque matchup out west! I’ll be using Arturo’s Points over Par flavor of Wins Produced for examining game stats.
Oklahoma City Thunder at Dallas Mavericks
Oklahoma City Thunder Stats
- PoP: +16.2
| Player | Pos | EFG% | FT% | TS% | FT | PTS | PoP/48 | PoP/G |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kevin Durant | 3.4 | 87% | 71% | 86% | 5 | 31 | 17.6 | 14.6 |
| Serge Ibaka | 4.1 | 63% | 0% | 63% | 0 | 10 | 14.5 | 8.0 |
| Daequan Cook | 2.0 | 64% | 0% | 64% | 0 | 9 | 13.3 | 3.1 |
| Kendrick Perkins | 5.0 | 25% | 0% | 25% | 0 | 2 | 0.6 | 0.4 |
| Derek Fisher | 1.0 | 56% | 0% | 56% | 0 | 10 | 0.2 | 0.1 |
| James Harden | 2.5 | 30% | 67% | 40% | 4 | 10 | -0.5 | -0.3 |
| Lazar Hayward | 3.0 | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0 | 0 | -5.9 | -0.6 |
| Thabo Sefolosha | 2.4 | 25% | 0% | 25% | 0 | 3 | -2.3 | -0.8 |
| Russell Westbrook | 1.3 | 47% | 50% | 48% | 2 | 20 | -1.5 | -1.0 |
| Nazr Mohammed | 5.0 | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0 | 0 | -10.6 | -1.1 |
| Nick Collison | 4.5 | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0 | 0 | -6.1 | -1.7 |
| Royal Ivey | 2.0 | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0 | 0 | -22.4 | -2.3 |
| Cole Aldrich | 5.0 | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0 | 0 | -23.4 | -2.4 |
| Player | MP | ORB | DRB | AST | PF | STL | TO | BS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kevin Durant | 39.9 | 0 | 3 | 6 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 |
| Russell Westbrook | 31.8 | 0 | 4 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 0 |
| Kendrick Perkins | 28.9 | 2 | 7 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Serge Ibaka | 26.7 | 4 | 7 | 0 | 4 | 1 | 0 | 4 |
| James Harden | 26.4 | 0 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 3 | 1 | 0 |
| Derek Fisher | 25.5 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Thabo Sefolosha | 16.8 | 0 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Nick Collison | 13.3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Daequan Cook | 11.3 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Cole Aldrich | 4.9 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Lazar Hayward | 4.9 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Nazr Mohammed | 4.9 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Royal Ivey | 4.9 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
In regards to the non-scoring stats Ibaka and Perkins put up impressive rebounding nights. No one really excelled at anything else, but hey when Durant is going to shoot over 80% from the field, does it matter?
Dallas Mavericks stats
- PoP: -16.1
| PLAYER | POS | EFG% | FT% | TS% | FT | PTS | POP/48 | POP/G |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brandan Wright | 4.0 | 50% | 0% | 50% | 0 | 2 | 11.4 | 2.0 |
| Brian Cardinal | 3.5 | 75% | 0% | 75% | 0 | 3 | 9.1 | 1.6 |
| Delonte West | 1.5 | 60% | 100% | 71% | 3 | 9 | 2.9 | 1.1 |
| Ian Mahinmi | 5.0 | 67% | 0% | 67% | 0 | 4 | 2.4 | 0.8 |
| Kelenna Azubuike | 3.0 | 50% | 0% | 50% | 0 | 3 | 3.7 | 0.4 |
| Yi Jianlian | 5.0 | 33% | 0% | 29% | 0 | 2 | -4.7 | -0.5 |
| Rodrigue Beaubois | 1.5 | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0 | 0 | -7.8 | -1.1 |
| Jason Kidd | 1.0 | 42% | 100% | 47% | 2 | 12 | -2.3 | -1.6 |
| Shawn Marion | 3.5 | 13% | 100% | 31% | 4 | 6 | -2.8 | -2 |
| Jason Terry | 2.0 | 40% | 75% | 47% | 3 | 11 | -4.7 | -3.1 |
| Brendan Haywood | 5.0 | 25% | 50% | 31% | 1 | 3 | -22.2 | -3.3 |
| Dirk Nowitzki | 4.5 | 40% | 63% | 46% | 5 | 17 | -5.1 | -4.1 |
| Vince Carter | 2.8 | 31% | 100% | 39% | 2 | 7 | -11.5 | -6.4 |
If we add up all of the Dallas Mavericks that had positive contributions they’d be worth around 1/3 of Kevin Durant’s performance. Dirk has been on a decline for a while. The days of Dirk and Vince Carter being elite players seems to be gone. Sadly Kidd and Marion didn’t show either and the Mavs core of former greats didn’t contend.
| Player | MP | ORB | DRB | AST | PF | STL | TO | BS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dirk Nowitzki | 38.8 | 1 | 8 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Jason Kidd | 33.9 | 0 | 5 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 0 |
| Shawn Marion | 33.9 | 3 | 7 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 2 |
| Jason Terry | 31.4 | 0 | 3 | 6 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 0 |
| Vince Carter | 26.6 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 4 | 0 | 2 | 1 |
| Delonte West | 19 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Ian Mahinmi | 15.9 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Brandan Wright | 8.5 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Brian Cardinal | 8.3 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Brendan Haywood | 7.1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Rodrigue Beaubois | 6.9 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Kelenna Azubuike | 4.9 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Yi Jianlian | 4.9 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Dirk did manage to actually rebound like forward. Sadly he wasn’t scoring like himself. Jason Kidd’s killer playmaking was gone. None of the other Mavs put up any stats that would give them a shot.
Summing up
Well clearly this series appears to be done. The defending champs have simply gotten old and the Thunder are a superior team. The first two games were close, in part thanks to a missing Durant and a surging Jason Terry. If Durant plays mediocre the Thunder should easily close out the Mavs. If Durant plays great, well the results speak for themselves. It should be noted that Durant put up the second best performance of the playoffs so far behind none other than King James. Are the storm clouds gathering?
-Dre