Shai Gilgeous Alexander made a jumper with 1.4 seconds left on the clock to give the Thunder their first victory this season
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander knocked down a tiebreaking jumper with 1.4 seconds left and finished with 24 points, seven rebounds and nine assists, helping the Oklahoma City Thunder hold off a furious rally by the Charlotte Hornets to win their season opener 109–107 Saturday night.
“The greats do it,” he said. “It’s a role I’m blessed to have. But I work extremely hard and I want to take full advantage of it. I have a couple moves I like to go to in iso. And then it’s just read and react. That’s a shot I practice a lot. And it went in.”
“He understood how much time he had and got to his spot,” said Mark Daigneault, who won in his debut as Oklahoma City’s coach.
George Hill finished the game with 21 points, Darius Bazley and Luguentz Dort added 15 points for the Thunder who won their first game after the game against the Rockets got postponed earlier this week due to multiple players testing positive to COVID-19.
“This season is a going to have a lot of ups and downs, some wins and losses, but the more we can stay together and be resilient, we will be fine,” Hill said.
The Thunder struggled with putting the game away in the final 2 minutes, missing free throws and turning the ball over. Daigneault said that will be an area the team must improve upon.
“We could have handled it better,” Daigneault said. “Hopefully we learn from it and handle it better next time.”
Terry Rozier had only 19 points, PJ Washington added 18 points and rookie LaMelo Ball put 13 points coming off the bench.
“I thought LaMelo played extremely well tonight,” Hornets coach James Borrego said. “There may be more minutes for him. Tonight was a good step for him.”
Ball seems to adjust well next to the other young players and soon he will earn some more playing time if he has performances like this one.
NEXT GAMES
The Thunder will host the Utah Jazz on Monday, while Hornets will take on the Brooklyn Nets on Sunday.