Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports
Russell Westbrook (R) is guarded by Paul Millsap and Jeff Teague.
Christian Post Report – The Oklahoma City Thunder will try to get their fourth straight win at home as they face the Atlanta Hawks at the Chesapeake Energy Arena. The match starts at 8 p.m. ET on March 20, 2015.
Currently holding on to the eighth spot in the West, the Thunder are only 0.5 games ahead of the New Orleans Hornets.
They have won four straight at home and three of their last four in total.
Their most recent result was a 122-118 win over the Boston Celtics.
In that victory, the Thunder big men played well to help the team. Enes Kanter scored 22 points while shooting 77 percent from the field. He also pulled down 10 rebounds in 31 minutes.
Steven Adams made his presence felt as a replacement for the injured Serge Ibaka. Adams scored 14 points while pulling down 13 rebounds in 38 minutes.
Russell Westbrook scored 36 but only went 31 percent from the field, but he pulled five rebounds, dished out 10 assists and had five steals to his credit.
Meanwhile, the Hawks recently lost 114-95 to the Golden State Warriors in a battle between the best of the East and West.
Despite starting off well, the Hawks could not stop the three point barrage from the Warriors and lost their own touch from beyond the arc – going 8-of-22 for the night. Paul Millsap and DeMarre Carroll both scored 16 points, but failed to get contributions from their other role players. Even worse was they shot 36 percent from the field, as compared to 52 percent for Golden State.
In terms of their head-to-head match-up, Atlanta won their first meeting against Oklahoma City.
A 103-93 score at Philips Arena, Millsap secured a double-double with 22 points and 10 rebounds in the win. Jeff Teague added 17 while shooting 54 percent only in 30 minutes of play.
For the Thunder, Westbrook had 22 points in 50 percent shooting, while Kevin Durant played 41 minutes to score 21 points. The main difference was in the free throw shooting percentage, where Oklahoma City only shot 61% from the stripe, while Atlanta went 13-of-13 in the night.
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Source : Christian Post