Aleksej Pokusevski Stars in Close Loss to Nuggets

The Thunder made it close in Denver Saturday night, showing progression among the young prospects across the board.

Saturday night, Oklahoma City somehow had a enough firepower to take the Nuggets right down to the wire down nearly the whole roster. The Thunder took the lead in the fourth quarter, but couldn’t hold on late falling 113-107 to Denver.

They were down key players, with Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Josh Giddey and Lu Dort all sidelined.

OKC’s biggest issue was slowing down Nikola Jokic, especially with the injury-riddled roster. The Joker dominated the Thunder, pouring in 35 points on 13-of-15 shooting to go along with 12 rebounds and eight assists.

Darius Bazley was injured after just 13 minutes of action, so Oklahoma City, a team already struggling with size, was down its only big man that hadn’t split time with the Blue this season.

The main reason OKC was able today stay in the game was because of the impressive attack from 3-point range. The Thunder drilled an uncharacteristic 14 3-pointers.

While the Thunder made Saturday nights game interesting, they are still in the midst of a huge losing skid. After beating the Magic Wednesday night, Oklahoma City has now won just one of its last 12 games.

Here are the top performers from Saturday’s slate who helped the Thunder keep it close:

Aleksej Pokusevski

Ron Chenoy / USA Today

Pokusevski played 34 minutes and was the only person in the starting five with a positive plus/minus. He has been alarmingly efficient as of late and is having the best stretch of basketball in his career.

Saturday night, he scored 17 points on just eight shots, going 5-for-8 from the floor. He drilled two 3-pointers too.

Poku also added five rebounds, five assists and two steals. His all-around performance almost singlehandedly propelled the Thunder to victory.

Theo Maledon

Reinhold Matay / USA TODAY Sports

The point guard from France recorded his second straight 20-point outing on Saturday night. He did so efficiently this time too, going 6-of-13 from the floor and shooting 50% from long range.

Maledon has also been the most consistent player on the Thunder when it comes to shooting free throws this week. Maledon went a combined 11-for-11.

His inconsistent play has been why he can’t find consistent minutes. If Maledon can keep scoring efficiently at a high clip, though, his minutes could carry more consistency.

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