OKC’s title last season was the culmination of one of the best seasons by a team in the NBA. Just like Boston had done it in the previous season, Oklahoma City was a top 3 team in both offense (#2) and defense (#1) – efficiency rankings via cleaningtheglass.
Their defensive strategy broke the traditional NBA paradigm created by San Antonio’s teams where they did everything to avoid fouling (in order to not concede FTs) and allowing second chance opportunities by being elite on defensive rebounding. However, Oklahoma City was so aggressive at chasing the opposing ball handlers and passing lanes that they led the league at forcing turnovers so clearly that it didn’t even matter that they were a subpar team in both rebounding (#21) and FTs allowed (#26). The key for that was having multiple great perimeter defensive players who allowed them to maintain so much pressure the whole game that their opponents couldn’t handle that.
The acquisition of Isaiah Hartenstein only helped OKC even more at having for the second season in a row the best rim defense in the league. Offensively, the team kept the same pattern from the previous season. The main focus was driving to the basket. Only Memphis had more drives per game than OKC and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander led the league in this stat with a ridiculous efficiency of 56.7% FG in these shots.
So, we are in front of a team that kept its identity from one season to the other and with more experience and better depth due to the arrival of Hartenstein and Caruso, they managed to dominate the league from Day 1 until they won the title in the NBA Finals.
Oklahoma City kept all their core players for the new season. The oldest player in the starting lineup is 27 years old. So, how won’t this team dominate again this year?
Possibly, Oklahoma City might relax a bit on defense or their opponents might be better prepared to handle their pressure. However, OKC has kept this system for two years now and have been elite on both ends of the floor. Unless there is a serious injury to a key player, it seems inevitable that OKC will have the best record in the league once again.