'I’m not too sure what it is': Defensive lapses plague Thunder in blowout loss at Hornets

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The old adage is that defense travels. That’s not necessarily a good thing.

The Thunder followed a poor defensive showing in San Antonio on Wednesday with another leaky performance Friday night in Charlotte.

The Hornets scored 69 points in the first half to build a 17-point halftime lead. The Thunder chipped away in the third quarter, once cutting the deficit to nine points, but Charlotte slammed shut the Thunder’s comeback window.

The Hornets pulled away again, beating the Thunder 121-98 at Spectrum Center.

Offense, not defense, has been the Thunder’s downfall this season. OKC ranks 13th in the NBA in defensive rating, but stops were scarce in Charlotte.

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“I’m not too sure what it is,” Shai Gilgeous-Alexander said of the Thunder’s defensive lapses. “But we’re not getting it done defensively, for sure. We have to try to fix that as soon as possible.”

After Thunder guard Ty Jerome questioned his team’s effort in San Antonio, the Thunder allowed the Hornets 26 fast-break points in the first half alone.

“We were really good defensively, and that’s what kept us in a lot of games,” rookie Josh Giddey said. It was more the offense we were struggling with. The last four or five games, it’s probably been the defense that has let us down a little bit.

“When we come out and when we want to compete, which we should want to every night, we’re a hard team to score against.”

The Thunder is 0-3 on its four-game road trip, which ends Saturday night in Cleveland.

With a 22-point loss at San Antonio, and a 23-point loss at Charlotte, the Thunder has lost back-to-back games by double digits for the first time since Dec. 10 (vs. Lakers) and Dec. 12 (vs. Mavericks).

Here are four more takeaways from Friday:

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SGA attacks

For a lot of the game, the Thunder’s offense was let Gilgeous-Alexander attack and see if the Hornets could stop him.

Gilgeous-Alexander ripped his way to the rim, where he shot a stellar 9-of-12.

From everywhere else, Gilgeous-Alexander was just 1-of-11. He finished with a team-high 29 points, along with six assists and five rebounds.

Gilgeous-Alexander was an efficient 8-of-9 from the free throw line.

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NBL showcase

Australia’s National Basketball League produced LaMelo Ball and Josh Giddey in back-to-back seasons. Not too bad.

Giddey and Ball, last season’s Rookie of the Year, are similar in a lot of ways. Specifically the supernova vision they share.

Both not only see passes most players can’t, but they also deliver them with spectacular accuracy.

Ball played one season for the Illawarra Hawks before entering the NBA draft. Giddey spent last season with the Adelaide 66ers.

“The first preseason game, we had a little joke,” Giddey said. “(Ball) didn’t get a foul call, and he said to me he would’ve gotten that in the NBL.”

Earlier this season, Giddey became the youngest player in NBA history to record a triple-double. Ball previously held the record.

Giddey scored a career-high 21 points against the Hornets on 10-of-17 shooting. He added nine rebounds and three assists. Giddey, like Gilgeous-Alexander, did most of his damage in the paint (9-of-13 shooting).

“I thought both of them played good floor games, made good decisions,” Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said. “Got their cracks and were able to get downhill.”

Ball shot just 4-of-12 against the Thunder, finishing with 10 points, nine rebounds and eight assists. Three Hornets scored at least 20 points: Terry Rozier (24), Miles Bridges (22) and PJ Washington (20).

Thunder rookie Aaron Wiggins defended Ball to start the game. Usually it’s Lu Dort who guards the opposing team’s best guard/wing, but Dort started on Hornets pogo stick Miles Bridges.

“(Bridges) leads them in scoring and has a pretty heavy usage rate,” Daigneault said of the decision. “His real game is sticking his shoulder in your chest, and getting Lu’s physicality on him we thought was a priority.

“Aaron defending the way that he has gives us some confidence that we can put him on a guy like Ball and move Dort around.”

It was a homecoming game for Wiggins, who’s from Greensboro, North Carolina. He greeted several friendly faces in the crowd after the game.

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Kenny Hustle is back

Kenrich Williams missed a free throw, tracked down the rebound and buried a corner 3-pointer.

Yeah, Kenny Hustle is back.

“Being able to go out and compete, that’s everything to me,” Williams said.

Williams played 16 minutes off the bench, his first action in 12 days. Williams cleared health and safety protocols on Friday, and he joined his teammates in Charlotte after missing the first two games of the Thunder’s road trip.

“I feel pretty good,” Williams said. “It’s been 10 days since I’ve really played a five-on-five game. My wind picked up in the second half.”

Thunder assistant coaches Mike Wilks and David Akinyooye are in health and safety protocols, but no Thunder players are in protocols now that Williams is back.

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Birthday gift

Mamadi Diakite signed a second 10-day contract with the Thunder on Friday, which happened to be Diakite’s 25th birthday.

Diakite’s first 10-day contract was via the COVID hardship exception, but this one is a standard 10-day deal.

Diakite has played in five games for the Thunder.

He’s reacclimating to the team after spending training camp with OKC. Diakite fractured his hip in a Thunder preseason game, and he didn’t make the roster coming out of camp.

“He had a pretty serious injury,” Daigneault said. “We can’t expect him to return to full performance yet without some reps and some time.”

Diakite brings some bounce to the frontcourt, which the Thunder lacks.

He had two points and four rebounds in 12 minutes off the bench Friday.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Thunder vs. Hornets: Five takeaways from OKC's loss at Charlotte