Oklahoma City's Shooting Efficiency Has Slipped, But its Defense Has Advanced

The Oklahoma City Thunder has shot and made less overall attempts from a year ago, but the team is grinding out wins thanks to its stout defense.

Nov 1, 2024; Portland, Oregon, USA; Portland Trail Blazers guard Anfernee Simons (1) takes a defensive position against Oklahoma City Thunder guard Cason Wallace (22) during the second quarter at Moda Center. Mandatory Credit: Brian Murphy-Imagn Images / Brian Murphy-Imagn Images

It's been easy to tell how dominant this Thunder defense has been thus far throughout the 2024-25 season. If you paid close attention to the team a year ago, you'd realize that the foundation was built but it was not entirely sharpened.

30 games into this season, it'd be difficult to say that this team is not the sharpest defense in the entire NBA at this moment. Oklahoma City leads the league in several highly important defensive categories. Firstly, a defensive rating of 103.0 trumps every other team with the Houston Rockets sitting in second with a 105.9.

That is an improvement on the Thunder's 111.0 defensive rating last year. On top of that, leading the league in steals while simultaneously committing the least amount of turnovers of any team has kept them afloat in so many contests this season already, and has saved them on poor shooting nights.

When looking back on last season, Oklahoma City's offensive production was a bit higher and more efficient through the regular season compared to now—as the 2023-24 Thunder shot 49.9% from the field and 38.9% from three to this year's 34.6% 3-point percentage and 46.4% shooting overall.

With a slight uptick in 3-point attempts and a decrease in 2-point attempts, the absence of Chet Holmgren can certainly be attributed to those numbers—but it doesn't matter as much since the OKC defense is absolutely thriving.

The Thunder's defensive leap from a year ago to now can't be understated in the success its season as a 25-5 team solidly holding the top spot in the Northwest Division and the Western Conference. Oklahoma City has held 15 teams to under 100 points in a game thus far this season, a number that is hard to rival and assists the Thunder immensely on the offensive side of the ball.

If the Thunder are able to get back to its normal form of its offensive efficiency, it will be an even more scary team to face in the West and eventually in the playoffs. For now, the team continues to put out highly impressive defensive performances, and it will go far in the long run.

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