Thunder's Gilgeous-Alexander shrugs off loss to Cavaliers in heavyweight clash

CLEVELAND — No long faces. No fingers pointed. No beliefs shaken.

You can’t win them all — despite recent evidence to the contrary — and no regular-season game, no matter how hyped, means enough to change your view on anything.

Learn and move on.

That’s the way Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and the Oklahoma City Thunder processed coming up short in a January battle of the titans.

The Thunder arrived in Cleveland as the hottest team in the NBA, riding the high of a 15-game winning streak, the only blemish on their growing resume their flat performance against the Milwaukee Bucks in the final of the NBA Cup. And that result doesn't even count in the regular-season standings.

But in their way Wednesday was the only team in the league that could credibly claim to be better than the Western Conference leaders. The Cleveland Cavaliers entered the showdown with a 10-game winning streak and the NBA’s best overall record.

It was not just another cold January night in Cleveland.

Broadcast giant ESPN altered its schedule to show the game in prime time. It was the first meeting in NBA history with winning streaks of 10 and 15 games and just the third time in league history two teams on pace to win 70 or more games — 70 (OKC) and 73 (Cleveland) — met this far into the regular season. It also was a match-up of the NBA’s No. 1-ranked defence (OKC) and No. 1-ranked offence (Cleveland).

The Thunder came up short, falling 129-122 to the Cavaliers in a game that featured 30 lead changes and in which the two teams were never separated by more than three possessions. The Cavs improved to 32-4 while OKC slipped to 32-6. No other team in the NBA has won 28 games yet.

The difference on the night was the Cavaliers' pair of elite seven footers, Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen, who were just too much to handle for the Thunder. OKC got a great night from one of its big men, Isaiah Hartenstein (18 points, 11 rebounds, eight assists), but the Thunder badly needed the services of their other one, Chet Holmgren, who has been out since Nov. 10 with a fractured hip.

Mobley finished with 21 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists, while Allen offered up 25 points, 12 rebounds (eight on the offensive end), six assists and three steals. The pivotal possession of the fourth quarter came with just under two minutes left when, with the Thunder trailing by two, Allen got the offensive rebound on a missed three by Darius Garland and was fouled by Gilgeous-Alexander. Allen missed his second free throw, only to have Mobley grab the rebound. When Cavs star Donovan Mitchell missed the ensuing jumper, Allen got that rebound. Then, when Mobley missed a look at a three, Allen got that rebound, too. There was one more miss and when Mitchell got that rebound (determined after a coach’s challenge), Mobley finally cashed in a short jumper to put Cleveland up five and it was a wrap.

But after the TV lights went down and the echo of the crowd noise finally faded, there was no sign in the Thunder locker room that an opportunity had been missed or a statement not made.

Lu Dort, the peerless perimeter defender and Canadian national team star, was chewing into some barbeque, well-earned after holding Mitchell to 11 points on 3-of-16 shooting, less than half his season average. “A Lu Dort masterclass,” said Gilgeous-Alexander of his fellow Canadian on his defensive effort. “Nothing new.”

For his part, Gilgeous-Alexander went the with the burger, washed down with some Gatorade, even if Hartenstein was chiding him for the sugar content. “I need the electrolytes, I’m always exercising,” he protested.

And when his post-game meal was done and it was time to assess coming out the on the wrong end of the much-hyped regular season showdown between two teams that lead their conferences and could very well meet in the NBA Finals, there was no frustration or disappointment from Gilgeous-Alexander.

Winning brings calmness, which shows with the Thunder. Even when I asked if there was any connection between the losses in two high-profile games in the past three weeks — to Milwaukee in the NBA Cup final and Wednesday night to the streaking Cavs — Gilgeous-Alexander barely batted an eye.

“We just lost twice in the month and half,” he shrugged. “It sucks that they’re the high-profile games. But like I said, we’re human out there, we can’t be perfect. Losing twice in a month and half, I’ll take no matter what stage the games are on.”

He’s probably right. Against the Bucks, it was their offence that didn’t travel — they scored a season-low 81 points — while against Cleveland, head coach Mark Daigneault lamented their defence as the Thunder allowed the most points they've given up this season and 25 points more than they give up on average.

“Defensively, with how we’ve played all season, we let them get loose, but that’s what they do to you, you have to be really, really good on every possession to get a stop," he said.

Gilgeous-Alexander has been on an absolute heater since he played — by his standards — a poor game in the Cup final. In 10 games heading into Wednesday night, the Toronto-born, Hamilton-raised point guard had put up video-game numbers, averaging 34 points, six rebounds, six assists, 2.3 steals and 1.5 blocked shots while shooting 56 per cent from the floor and 42 per cent from three.

His stats and the Thunder's winning have made him at worst a co-favourite for MVP with the Denver Nuggets' Nikola Jokic.

A giant performance Wednesday might have helped his cause, but Gilgeous-Alexander was — again, by his elevated standards — merely good, as opposed to otherworldly excellent. He finished with 31 points but shot 13-of-27 from the floor and just 1-of-6 from three. And while he did manage three steals and two blocked shots, his five turnovers were uncharacteristic.

Did the Cavs' size around the rim bother him? Again, the kind of success Gilgeous-Alexander has had and the Thunder have enjoyed means that one loss and a rough night in the paint — he was 3-of-9 in the mid-range area — aren’t going to bother him.

“They’re good rim protectors, they have two of them,” he said in reference to the Cavs’ big-man tandem. “So if one of them comes off, there's always one around the rim. They do a good job of roaming and staying around the rim.”

Matter of fact.

The Thunder are in the midst of a potentially historic season — the franchise still looking for its first NBA title since the Seattle Supersonics moved to OKC for the 2008-09 season — and at the start of a tough East coast road trip, having just swept the New York Knicks and Boston Celtics at home in the past week.

There are plenty of challenges to come and maybe history to be made. So even after a match-up between two elite teams at this point in the regular season, the overwhelming feeling was gratitude for the opportunity, and on to the next.

“It was fun, just like any other night in an 82-game season,” said Gilgeous-Alexander. “A chance to compete, a chance to play the best team, the best players in the world, that’s what the NBA’s about, that’s what you wake up for, that’s what you’re excited for when you got to sleep. It was fun, we came up on the short end of the stick tonight, but you can’t win them all … we weren't going to win the rest of the games of the season. ... Still proud of guys for at the end of the night, getting better and I think we did.”

Besides, the Thunder will get their chance to right this wrong. The Cavs are in OKC on Jan. 16.