Pre-Season Game 2 Recap: Miami 103, Oklahoma City 96

My apologies, but internet issues have forced me to post a late recap once again.

And what was anticipated to be an incredibly epic game has turned into a slight disappointment. Dwayne Wade, who apparently had tweaked his ankle in the first few minutes of the Heat's Pre-Season game, was unable to play in last night's game. On top of that, the Heat looked lazy, and the Thunder didn't match up with them in the third, leading to the nasty final result that you see above.

The battle of LeBron versus KD was pretty disappointing. Both of them got off to slow starts, took lots of trips to the line, and didn't have any highlight reel dunks. Chris Bosh spent most of the time shooting mid-range jumpers, almost looking like D.J. White out there. Nonetheless, his 23 Points and 7 Rebounds does earn him the Thunder Plunderer Award. The rest of the Heat roster was peripheral at best, with Mike Miller being a decent outside shooter and Big Z getting a few points down low.

On the Thunder side of things, Russell Westbrook had his usual line of 18 Points, 4 Rebounds, 6 Assists, 2 Steals, and 2 Blocks, which is deserving of the Thunder Wonder award. This is especially so, since he had only one turnover. James Harden had 14 Points, but he had a whopping 5 Turnovers (Thunder Blunder). Eric Maynor managed to keep the turnovers down with 6 assists, 2 turnovers, and 11 assists. And Kevin Durant had 21 Points and 4 Rebounds, netting him the Thunder Down Under Award.

Below: Some Individual Player Analysis, The Flow of the Game!

We got our first look at Deaquan Cook, who is usually considered to be a 3 Point Specialist. And today, he seemed to spur that idea by going 3-7 from beyond the arc and scoring 9 Points, but he also had a remarkable 2 steals. Throughout his career, he's averaged less than half of a steal, so this could be a good sign of things to come.

Cole Aldrich continued to show his hustle by getting 3 Blocks, a Steal, 4 Rebounds, and an Assist. He only scored two points, but he only took one shot. That's somewhat of a good thing, because we know he won't spend time trying to be something he's not, but it also could indicate that he's not very good at finding his own scores. You'd think he'd get a few more opportunities in front of all of those Kansas Fans.

Lastly, it's good to give mention to Serge Ibaka, who had a so-so game, but had an amazing Ally-Oop dunk near the end of the game. If you looked close enough while frame-by-framing it on your DVR, you could see that he caught the ball with his wrists in mid-air, and managed to dunk it with his hands. Now that's slammin'!

The flow of the game wasn't very competitive. It was an even game until the third, when Chris Bosh hit several shots in a row, and Kevin Durant missed a slew of jumpers. Both teams took out their starters at that point, and the Thunder made some small runs at the Heat lead (the most significant of which was at the end of the game). But, when you consider how the starters performed, you can't help but chalking this up as a loss in the regular season. Two Superstars were too much to deal with, and when there's three, I don't think we'll stand much of a chance, unless Jeff Green steps out of his slump.

Next Game: Versus the Memphis Grizzlies (in Tulsa), Tuesday, October 12th, 7 PM Central Daylight Time.