Role players contribute to OKC Thunder win

The OKC Thunder finally got a win on Friday against the Los Angeles Clippers and they got big help from role players.

We all know what the OK3 did for the Oklahoma City Thunder Friday night. Paul George went for 42 points, nine rebounds and seven assists. Westbrook had 22 points and eight assists. Finally, Carmelo Anthony had 14 points. Two role players, though, were the unspoken heroes in the 120-111 win against the Los Angeles Clippers to end a four-game losing streak.

We all know about the main bench scoring players for the OKC Thunder in Jerami Grant and Raymond Felton, who had seven and five respectively, but rookie center Dakari Johnson and second-year guard Alex Abrines came up big for the Oklahoma City Thunder.

Johnson’s key contribution to the win was filling in for Steven Adams, who was out with a right calf contusion. There was speculation that Patrick Patterson or even Jerami Grant would fill in for Adams at the center position, but Johnson proved that he could be relied on to play big minutes.

He held up well against All-Star center DeAndre Jordan. Johnson talked about how it was to go up against DeAndre Jordan in his first career start.

Via USA TODAY:

"“It was good. I just tried to go out there and be competitive, just compete. He’s a very great player. I’m not scared of anybody, so I just went out there and competed.”"

Before the game, Johnson was only averaging 2.7 minutes per game but in this matchup he played 23 minutes of game time. He finished with nine points and two rebounds. Johnson was called up from the team’s G League affiliate, the Oklahoma City Blues, this summer after putting up big numbers.

In the two years that Johnson played in the G League, he averaged 15.4 points, 7.9 rebounds and 1.2 blocks a game. Johnson was a G League All-Star and last season, he led the Blue to the Western Conference Finals.

Johnson, a McDonald’s All-American, who was a five-star player was heavily recruited out of high school. He played at legendary Montverde Academy where Joel Embiid, Ben Simmons, and D’Angelo Russell also played. While he played at Kentucky, he played behind Julius Randle, Willie Cauley-Stein and Karl-Anthony Towns.

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Johnson was not the only standout role player from the win on Friday. Alex Abrines scored 14 points while shooting 3-of-4 from the 3-point line. Abrines is taking a step into the right direction after only averaging 3.8 points a game before the Clippers game.

His ability to shoot the 3-pointer is the asset that the Thunder need him to bring consistently because the Thunder are having problems hitting shots. Abrines was on the team last year when it was the Westbrook show, so he knows how much the team can suffer without help.

He only averaged 6.0 points a game in 2016-17. If he is able to develop and get his 3-point shot to fall consistently, the Thunder may be able to string together wins.

The Thunder know the Big Three will show up because of their experience in the league and talent. The role players will have to step up and make shots if the Thunder want to succeed, though.

Next: 2017-18 Week 4 NBA Power Rankings

Besides Ray Felton and Patrick Patterson, the Thunder have a young talented bench with Abrines, Grant and Johnson. If they can get them to develop and play at a consistent level by putting them in situations where their talents can be exemplified, then that may be enough to put the Thunder on the right track.