Here are Saturday’s D-League assignments and recalls from around the NBA:
The Knicks assigned forward Maurice Ndour to the Westchester Knicks and he will play against the Erie Bay Hawks tonight, the team’s PR staff tweets. The power forward has appeared in 10 NBA games this season, averaging 2.3 points and 1.6 rebounds in 8.1 minutes.
The Celtics assigned forward Jordan Mickey to their D-League affiliate, the Maine Red Claws, the team tweets. The second-year power forward has appeared in eight games with Boston this season, averaging 2.3 points and 1.8 rebounds in 8.3 minutes.
The Thunder recalled forward Josh Huestis from the Oklahoma City Blue, the team announced in a press release. In four games with the Blue this season, Huestis is averaging 9.3 points, 6.5 rebounds, 1.8 assists and 2.00 blocks in 31.8 minutes. He has yet to make his season debut with the Thunder.
The Spurs assigned Davis Bertans and Dejounte Murray to their D-League affiliate, the Austin Spurs, according to the team’s website. Both players are available tonight for Austin’s game against the Salt Lake City Stars.
The Nets have recalled forwards Anthony Bennett and Chris McCullough from their Long Island affiliate, the team announced in a press release. Both started Long Island’s game today and were available for Brooklyn’s game with the Clippers.
The Raptors have quickly recalled Caboclo and VanVleet, whose assignments to the D-League were noted below (Twitter link).
2:07pm:
After getting a rare shot at playing time for the Raptors on Monday night in the team’s blowout of the 76ers, Bruno Caboclo and Fred VanVleet have been re-assigned to Raptors 905, according to Blake Murphy of Raptors Republic. As Murphy writes, the schedules for Toronto’s NBA and D-League teams overlap neatly this week, so Caboclo and VanVleet could be up and down a couple more times.
Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot, who received some playing time on the other side of that blowout in Toronto on Monday, has been assigned to the Delaware 87ers in advance of the team’s Tuesday night contest, according to a press release issued by the Sixers. The 2016 first-rounder has appeared in 11 games for Philadelphia so far, and one for Delaware.
Former first-round pick Josh Huestis has been re-assigned to the Oklahoma City Blue, the Thunder announced today in a press release. Huestis has appeared in a pair of games for the D-League squad so far, averaging a modest 9.0 PPG and 6.5 RPG.
Lakers shooting guard Nick Young will undergo an MRI on Wednesday after leaving tonight’s game with a strained right Achilles tendon, writes Mark Medina of The Orange County Register. Young suffered the injury about two minutes into the game in New Orleans and had to be helped off the court. The Lakers are concerned that he might be out for an extended period, according to Medina. Young, who many observers thought might get waived during the offseason, has been a pleasant surprise for the Lakers and one of the reasons they are in playoff contention. He claimed a starting job and has averaged 14.6 points per game while shooting 45.8% from the field. The team’s starting point guard, D’Angelo Russell, is already sidelined with soreness in his left knee.
There’s more out of the Western Conference:
Pelicans guard Anthony Brown isn’t holding a grudge against the Lakers for waiving him during the preseason, according to Mark Medina of The Los Angeles Daily News. Brown said he understands it would have been hard to earn playing time on a team filled with wing players such as Young, Jordan Clarkson, Lou Williams, Brandon Ingram and Luol Deng. “He’s a smart kid and a smart player. I think it means he has the right attitude,” Lakers coach Luke Walton said of Brown. “It’s the truth. You can take these situations and pout and blame other people. Or you can use it to make you better and motivate you.”
Anthony Davis is rising to the defense of his much-maligned teammates, relays Justin Verrier of ESPN.com. Davis is putting up All-Star numbers once again, but the Pelicans are off to a 7-12 start amid complaints that the front office hasn’t put enough talent around their franchise big man. “I’m on social media, so I see it all the time,” Davis said in a recent interview with ESPN’s Marc Stein. “But I think, for me, it’s just about the guys in that locker room. I know they come out here every day in practice and every night in the game and fight and leave everything on the floor. It’s nothing that I try to pay attention to as much. But you see it. You have to pay attention to it. For me, that’s not my M.O. to get into all the media and all that stuff. I just worry about what’s going on in that locker room and on the floor with the guys I have in the locker room.”
Veteran shooting specialist Anthony Morrow is starting to get more playing time with the Thunder, writes Susan Bible of Basketball Insiders. Coach Billy Donovan has expanded Morrow’s minutes over the past three games and he has responded by averaging 15 points per night. “He can score,” teammate Russell Westbrook said. “I’m not worried about A-Mo. This is not a surprise to me. Maybe it surprised some other people, but to me, I’ve seen him do this since I’ve been here.”
As the clear leader of the Thunder this season, Russell Westbrook is providing a singular voice for the team, according to Brett Dawson of The Oklahoman. Meanwhile, Enes Kanter – occasionally mentioned as a possible trade candidate – says he expects head coach Billy Donovan to trust him “more and more” down the road, writes Erik Horne of The Oklahoman.
After averaging 9.5 RPG in his first 15 games of the season, Russell Westbrook has dominated the glass over his last four contests, piling up 54 boards in those games, including 18 on Monday night. The hot streak has increased his rebounds per game average to 10.3, to go along with an incredible 30.9 PPG and 11.3 APG. Yes, Westbrook is averaging a triple-double and 30+ PPG through nearly a quarter of the NBA season.
The fact that Westbrook is posting eye-popping numbers so far this season is hardly a surprise. As soon as Kevin Durant departed Oklahoma City and it became clear that Westbrook wasn’t going anywhere, NBA observers – and fantasy basketball players – began speculating about what kind of monster stats the star point guard could rack up as the star of the show for the Thunder.
Still, no player in NBA history has averaged a triple-double since Oscar Robertson did it over 50 years ago, so Westbrook’s current numbers place him in rarefied air. While head coach Billy Donovan says the idea of Westbrook averaging a triple-double for the entire season isn’t a topic of conversation that comes up often within the Thunder locker room, Donovan was willing to entertain the idea, as Fred Katz of The Norman Transcript writes.
“Yeah, he could do it. He could do it,” Donovan said. “I’m not gonna say he is or isn’t because I think the more important thing is Russell is winning, but he’s a guy that has great impact on generating assists. He has a great impact on rebounding the basketball, and he can score. So, there’s certainly a possibility that can happen. Obviously what he’s done this point in time has been pretty remarkable.”
Westbrook set career highs last season with 10.4 APG and 7.8 RPG, so averaging double-digits in assists isn’t out of the realm of possibility for him, but averaging double-digits in rebounds would require a substantial leap from his career rate of 5.7 RPG. It’s also worth noting that the 28-year-old has never averaged more than 28.1 PPG in a season, and his current scoring rate easily eclipses that mark as well.
For Westbrook, his final numbers may ultimately depend on his ability to avoid wearing down over the course of the year. Currently, his usage rate (40.7) easily ranks first among NBA players, and it remains to be seen if he can keep up that pace for 82 games.
What do you think? Will Westbrook make history and average a triple-double this season, or is too unrealistic to expect him to keep up this pace for the entire year?
The Thunder have been happy with the production of Jerami Grant, but communication on defense is still an issue, according to Erik Horne of The Oklahoman. Since being acquired from Philadelphia in a November 1st trade, Grant is shooting better than 47% from 3-point range and has more than a block per game. He is adopting the role once filled by Serge Ibaka and his playing time has risen to more than 20 minutes per night. “Jerami’s a long, rangy defender that in the right spot causes a lot of problems,” said coach Billy Donovan. “In the wrong spot, we’re now trying to play catch-up. And it’s not just with Jerami. It could be any one of our players where that’s happening, and we’ve all consistently got to do a better job of doing that.”
November 26th, 2016 at 3:58pm CST by Dana Gauruder
Thunder coach Billy Donovan is trying to not overwork his franchise player, point guard Russell Westbrook, Erik Horne of The Oklahoman reports. Westbrook is averaging 35.2 minutes after the team’s overtime victory against the Nuggets on Friday. That’s an uptick from the past two seasons, when he averaged 34.4 minutes during each campaign, but Donovan is satisfied by the way he’s managing Westbrook’s playing time. “Outside the overtime games, I’m pretty pleased at where his minutes have been,” Donovan said. “We’ve been pretty fortunate there.”
Offseason addition Joffrey Lauvergne is taking away minutes from Enes Kanter in Oklahoma City, notes Erik Horne of The Oklahoman. Lauvergne, acquired in an August trade with the Nuggets, has impressed the Thunder with a combination of defense and long-range shooting. “A lot of it’s going to be based on matchups, how the game’s going, who’s alongside of him, do we have the speed and quickness in the frontcourt,” OKC coach Billy Donovan said when asked about Kanter’s playing time. “That’s not to say the last couple of games with Enes, with his minutes, he’s not going to play more because I do think he and Steven [Adams] together is a good combination for us.”
Steven Adams is struggling this season and Erik Horne of The Oklahoman examines what is causing the lack of production. Horne believes that the Thunder’s lack of perimeter shooting is clogging the lane, which severely hurts the team’s pick-and-roll offense. Adams enjoyed great spacing last season with Durant drawing away defenders, but this season, defenders are having an easier time denying passing lanes without having to worry about defending one of the league’s best shooters on the wing.
Adams, who signed a four-year, $100MM extension with the team prior to the season, has been playing with an injured hand recently, but he downplayed the injury after a disappointing game against Houston last week. “It was just that I sucked pretty much,” Adams said. “That’s what the bottom line is.”
Here’s more from Oklahoma City:
Coach Billy Donovan believes the disappointment in Adams’ play comes as a result of outlandish expectations, Horne relays in the same piece. “For people to say ‘this is the expectation, he’s gonna be a 16 [points] and 10 [rebounds] guy’ now when that’s not who he’s ever been, we need Steven to be who Steven’s always been,” Donovan said. “When he does that, it really impacts our team.” Adams is averaging 9.9 points and 8.1 rebounds per game for the Thunder this season.
New additionVictor Oladipo has been the team’s back-up point guard with Semaj Christonmissing action because of a concussion and the Thunder are impressed with his play, Horne writes in a separate piece. “The last few games, the results have been really positive for him,” Donovan said. Oladipo signed four-year, $84MM extension with the team last month.
November 21st, 2016 at 6:58pm CST by Eddie Scarito
The Thunder have shown interest in Kings forward Rudy Gay, who has indicated that he will opt out of his deal and head elsewhere after the season, but Sacramento isn’t ready to trade the player yet, according to Steve Kyler of Basketball Insiders (Twitter link).
