Inside The Thunder

Diallo Drives Thunder

Despite losing to the Clippers in their last seeding game, there's still a lot to like about the Oklahoma City Thunder going into the playoffs.

Erik Gee

Hamidou Diallo continues to show he will play hard no matter what the circumstances are. In a game that didn't matter, Diallo was a constant spark of energy. 

Playing over 40 minutes and Scoring 27 points in the Thunders 107-103 loss the Clippers.  

Billy Donovan says, "I think Hammi [Diallo] had a lot to do with us playing faster and attacking and getting to the paint."..."He could have had much, much bigger scoring night he missed a lot of plays around the rim that were right there, just didn't fall for him." .."But, he played with a lot of energy and was very very explosive."

Oklahoma City will need that exuberance for every game against the Rockets. Diallo will likely be called on to guard James Harden. Harden is averaging 34 points this season.  

Diallo is all too excited to get his shot at the former MVP "These are the type of things we workout for every day."..."It's gonna be an interesting series, but we just gotta prepare and get ready and follow the game plan."

Helping Diallo with the task of trying to hold Harden down will be Lu Dort (if healthy) and Andre Roberson. Roberson's playing time has been "erratic" during the seeding games, but on Friday to get him more into a rhythm, Donovan played him 28 minutes. 

"I thought physically he handled his minutes really really well."..."It was good to get him a good constant amount of playing time, and I thought defensively he took a step forward." Donovan said. 

The most important news on Friday was the return of Dennis Schroder.  Schroder, who started in place of Chirs Paul (wrist injury), went 6/12, scoring 17 points. 

One other note, Abdel Nader was a late scratch, Donovan says Nader had an issue with his neck that was causing tingling in his elbow. 

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Erik Gee
ERIK GEE

With more than 20 years of experience hosting local and national radio shows, Erik Gee is a fixture of Oklahoma sports media. He has covered the Oklahoma City Thunder for the past six seasons. He is also the co-host of the Pat Jones show on 97.1 The Sports Animal in Tulsa. 

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