After their recent showdown with the Boston Celtics, it seems that the Oklahoma City Thunder still has a lot of hiccups to figure out heading to the playoffs. This tough loss to Boston is a wake-up call for the team, considering their 12-game winning streak has been snapped.

It was quite a disappointing game for sure. By now, fans were disappointed that OKC lost to Boston in what could have been a winnable game. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander dropped his usual 30-point game, but none of the team stepped up to match his energy. Compared to the previous games, this was much of a letdown.

In a game where OKC played healthy for the first time, it felt really hard to watch the team chuck up shots and miss them by a mile. The fact that Luguentz Dort was the second-best scorer in the game says a lot about how everyone else struggled aside from SGA. By now, this is a very concerning problem to look out for.

Jalen Williams was very hard to watch as he bricked shots en route to clearing minutes restrictions. Both Ajay Mitchell and Jared McCain–who were on fire heading into this game–were quite silenced. Not even first-time All-Star Chet Holmgren has been able to make his presence felt, finishing with a meager 10 points on 3-of-7 shooting from the field.

This is a hilarious and alarming problem for the Thunder, who now have nine games left to play while also being two games ahead in the Western Conference standings. By now, you’d expect OKC to have almost everything figured out, and yet we’re seeing very rough issues at this point.

Overreliance on Shai is a Big Negative

SGA easily had one of his best nights in the NBA in this loss. He finished with 33 points on 10-12 shooting, including 3-of-4 from deep. However, it was definitely wasted with the loss, considering that he’s the only player to breach more than 20 points (Dort had 14). So far, the offense looked bleak for OKC, and it’s because they were relying too much on Shai.

For starters, Shai had the ball pretty much for the fourth quarter with the Thunder down by as many as 10 points. Of course, Boston’s coverage would adjust to double-team him, and it definitely opened up good looks for the rest of the team, but it was definitely an off-night in terms of shooting.

The fact that they’re running the same play as they did in 2024 is shocking. After all, this is a play where Shai would drive into the paint and kick out to open shooters on the wings or cutters heading into the rim. However, that didn’t happen as other OKC players were struggling to put up buckets, even finishing with 12-37 on threes for 32.4%.

Not long ago, many fans were quick to say that the Thunder are getting hotter than ever. But with their 12-game winning streak snapped, they’re finally back to square one. This overreliance on SGA definitely needs to be fixed, and it should be gone before they begin their playoff chase.

A Chance to Iron Out Wrinkles

Now at 57-16, it’s safe to say that OKC isn’t a perfect team. Now more than ever, we are seeing them become more vulnerable than ever as the rest of the league catches up. Still, this doesn’t mean Oklahoma City doesn’t have the best winning chance out there for the league title.

J-Dub, Mitchell, and McCain need to get back to consistency. Chet also has to become the second scoring option he’s meant to be. The Thunder bench needs to find its groove once more. If all those are addressed soon, we may still find a bigger, badder, and better OKC team than what was seen against Boston.