Oklahoma City Thunder scores season-low 81 in NBA Cup Finals

LAS VEGAS — The only good thing about the Oklahoma City Thunder’s offensive performance in Tuesday’s NBA Cup Final is that it doesn’t factor into regular-season stats.

The Thunder had their worst offensive performance of the season in a 97-81 loss to the Milwaukee Bucks and reached season lows in points, field goal percentage (33.7%) and 3-point percentage (15. 6%).

“I never look at it as if we just made missed shots,” Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said. “I could have done better to get us out at different times in this game, but we can learn from it.”

Oklahoma City superstar Shai Gilgeous-Alexander had an uncharacteristically inefficient performance of 21 points. According to ESPN Research, he was 8 of 24 from the floor, including 3 of 12 when Milwaukee’s Andre Jackson Jr. was the primary defender.

“He did a good job tonight, but I don’t think he was the reason for my night,” said Gilgeous-Alexander, who is averaging 30.3 points per game on 51.0% shooting this season . “The way I felt tonight, I still achieved my goals. I just didn’t get anything done. Things like this happen. Nights like this happen. Yes, he played hard, was aggressive. Nothing I haven’t seen before. I felt like I missed it even more.”

Gilgeous-Alexander shot 2 of 9 from 3-point range. He was the only Oklahoma City player to make multiple three-pointers as the Thunder shot 5 of 32 from distance.

“It’s hard to win that way,” said Thunder center Isaiah Hartenstein, who scored 14 of his 16 points in the first half. “You just have those nights sometimes.”

According to Second Spectrum tracking, the Thunder had an expected 3-point percentage of 34.9% based on the quality of their performance against the Bucks. The 19.3% drop in Oklahoma City’s true 3-point percentage was the most drastic of the season for the Thunder.

“I thought we looked good for the most part,” said Thunder forward Jalen Williams, who scored 18 points on 8 of 20 shooting. “When you play against a good team, you have to constantly create good looks and also make shots. I feel like it was just one of those nights. Defensively I thought we were pretty good. Sometimes that’s just not the case. You don’t have to go in and you have to have the will to continue to do the right thing, move the ball and leave the chips where they lie.”

Oklahoma City made just one of 17 3-point attempts in the first half, but the Thunder stayed in the game by primarily attacking the paint against the bigger Bucks. The Thunder scored 26 points in the game and were 13 of 16 from the field in the first half.

Those numbers plummeted in the second half as the Bucks held the Thunder to just 31 points as Milwaukee turned a one-point halftime lead into a one-sided finale. Oklahoma City scored just eight points in the second half and attempted just six free throws.

“We missed some shots that we normally make,” Thunder guard Alex Caruso said. “They do a good job dropping into the paint, and we got a couple easy ones early and then just missed a couple open (3s) that they could have spread out and gotten out of the paint a little bit. … At the end of the day, you need a few if you want to win at a high level.”