Cavaliers at Thunder
The Oklahoma City Thunder are winners of 12 of their last 15 games but remain unsatisfied with their individual performances. Thunder star Russell Westbrook will find out if some extra work on his shot paid off when the Thunder host the Cleveland Cavaliers on Wednesday.
Westbrook went back to the court to shoot in full uniform after going 1-of-12 from 3-point range in a 105-98 loss to the Denver Nuggets on Saturday and continues to search for ways to improve. "I'll look at the film and see and figure out how I can be better," Westbrook told reporters. "But each game, in a loss, I figure out a way to make sure that my guys are ready to play, and I come back and improve some part of my game and read the game." The Cavaliers came up short in their quest for a third straight win and fell 102-95 to the Minnesota Timberwolves on Monday but feel they are on the uptick. "We're going in the right direction," Cleveland swingman Kyle Korver told reporters. "We had a tough stretch. We've got to keep on bringing the same juice, we’ve got to keep on getting better, keep on learning, keep on building our chemistry and all these things."
TV: 8 p.m. ET, FS Ohio (Cleveland), FS Oklahoma
ABOUT THE CAVALIERS (4-15): Cleveland had a chance to notch its first three-game winning streak of the season on Monday and came away from the loss proud of the way it competed. "It shows a lot of growth," guard Rodney Hood told reporters. "When they stretched it from eight to 12 points at times we could have just gave in, but we didn't, we kept fighting. We'll be in that position and hopefully we'll hit a couple more shots and hopefully make a couple more plays on the defensive end and maybe win the game. This is how the NBA works. I think this is a good learning curve for us and we'll see what happens next time we're in that position." Hood scored 20 points in the loss and is averaging 18 over the last three contests.
ABOUT THE THUNDER (12-7): Westbrook downplayed his shooting woes and is focusing on the other end of the floor, where Oklahoma City dug itself a deep hole by allowing the Nugget to score 63 first-half points on Saturday. "You miss shots you usually make, it's fine," Westbrook told reporters. "We made them the other night, but tonight we didn't make 'em. But for us, we've still got to defend. We're not a team that leans on our offense and that's the reason we're the No. 1 defensive team in the league, because we defend at a high level." Westbrook still managed a triple-double with 16 points, 12 assists and 10 rebounds on Saturday - his second in the last three games.
BUZZER BEATERS
1. Cavaliers SG David Nwaba (knee) sat out Monday and is day-to-day.
2. Thunder C Steven Adams recorded a double-double in four of the last five games.
3. The visiting team took the last three in the series, with Oklahoma City earning a 95-86 victory at Cleveland on Nov. 7.