PHOTO/Zach Beeker
The Thunder were down and looked to be out with a handful of seconds more than two minutes to play in last night's game with Milwaukee.
OKC had started well and led the Bucks at halftime but another poor 3rd quarter that saw the Bucks outscore the Thunder 37-24 had put them behind. They trailed by 11 points with 2:04 to play and fans were slowly starting for the exits.
Dennis Schroder decided he wasn't ready to call it quits quite yet and hit a 15-foot pullup jumper. After a Milwaukee miss Schroder drained 26-footer for three more points and all of a sudden OKC trailed by just a half dozen and those fans who were leaving were back in their seats.
Coming out of a Thunder timeout after a Bucks bucket Schroder hit another deep three to cut the deficit to five then the Bucks turned it over seconds later and Chris Paul drove the lane and dropped a floater in to get the margin down to three. The Bucks quickly turned it over again and Danilo Gallinari, who'd been just 1-for-8 on threes, hit from beyond the arc with Brook Lopez throwing a hand in his face and OKC had new life and a tie ball game at 114.
It would get no better than that as Lopez knocked down a three to give the Bucks some breathing room and OKC lost 121-119.
It was another close defeat, OKC's sixth in the first 10 games, but it was a valiant effort.
"We were a little out of it there coming down the stretch," admitted head coach Billy Donovan. "Dennis [Schröder] got hot, made some shots, and did a fairly good job executing down the stretch. In terms of our team, and the way we battled and played everybody that was out there, as a coach, you couldn’t ask anything more from those guys.”
Gallinari wasn't happy with his shooting overall last night but he was certainly proud of the way he and his teammates refused to give in.
“We had a lot of fight in us," Gallinari said after the game. "And that’s something we’re going to bring every night. That’s something that we try and make a guarantee for this team to bring it every night.”
The Thunder won't practice today before they fly to Indianapolis for their game tomorrow night against the Pacers. They'll be back in action at home on Friday night hosting the Philadelphia 76ers.
More on last night's game in the boxes below.