As the game progressed, when Durant failed to beat Meng Xu in a row, even though Durant was unwilling, Durant still forced down the idea of wanting to continue to single Meng Xu, and began to play without the ball.

Because he has played a scoring guard for nearly two seasons, Durant's ability to run without the ball is still very good, coupled with his standard power forward-like height, which makes Durant very difficult to defend in terms of receiving and shooting after running without the ball, and more importantly, Durant playing without the ball will inevitably reduce the time of holding the ball, so Durant can also reduce the number of mistakes when dribbling or breaking, today's game, only half of the first quarter, Durant has made two mistakes.

Because Durant failed to beat Meng Xu in the opening stage, this made the Thunder dig a big hole by the Spurs and himself at the beginning of the game, although after Durant changed to play without the ball, the situation on the court improved, but the Spurs still firmly occupy the lead, and Scott Brooks, as the head coach of the Thunder, after seeing that the Thunder has never been able to close the score, his heart is gradually a little anxious.

Originally, before the start of this game, Scott Brooks also wanted to use the home court advantage to catch the Spurs off guard after the game started, and then take the opportunity to open the score, but the current situation is that the Spurs caught the Thunder off guard after the opening, and the first quarter of the game has not ended, and the Spurs have led by nearly 10 points, and the Thunder have no way to narrow the gap between the two sides no matter how hard they try.

And to Scott Brooks' surprise, Meng Xu, who was very powerful in the series with the Warriors, was willing to be a green leaf in this game with the Thunder, and he didn't even make a shot in the first quarter of the game, and the data was also very strange 0 points, 4 rebounds, 5 assists, 3 steals, 1 block, but Tim Duncan and Kawhi Leonard made crazy shots in the first quarter of the game, and these two people have now teamed up to score 20 points.

Although Scott Brooks believes that the reason for this situation is because of his targeted defense against Meng Xu, but Scott Brooks also has some suspicions that this is the conspiracy of Popovich's old fox, so that Meng Xu can attract the bag, and then create opportunities for other players of the Spurs, but Scott Brooks does not dare to relax his defense of Meng Xu, and the tragic ending of the Warriors is a lesson for the Thunder. Then he looked at the other Spurs players who had empty positions because of Meng Xu's inclusion again and again, and shot one shot after another.

When there were two minutes left in the first quarter of the game, Scott Brooks, who couldn't withstand the pressure, called a long timeout, Kevin Durant could only give up the offense with the ball and play without the ball under Meng Xu's defense, and Russell Westbrook's situation, although slightly better than Durant, was also limited, and shooting has always been Westbrook's shortcoming, especially three-point shots, so when Durant began to play without the ball, the Spurs relaxed their defense against Westbrook, Trying to stop the linkage between him and Durant, Westbrook began to increase his shots when the defense was a little loose, but the breakthrough was limited, but the result was that Westbrook shot 1 of 4 in the first two minutes, and the Spurs extended their lead to 11 points.

The first quarter of the game was not over, and the Thunder who were fighting at home were already 11 points behind, such a point difference, such a situation, for the Thunder and Scott Brooks, was undoubtedly unacceptable, so Scott Brooks had to call a timeout at the end of the first quarter of the game, adjust the Thunder's tactics, and by the way, let the Thunder players on the court calm down, let them know that the situation on the court has no way to go on.

"I didn't expect the Thunder to play like this with the Spurs at home, you must know that Meng Xu has not started to exert his strength yet."

"Both offensively and defensively, the Thunder are in a very bad situation right now, obviously they have underestimated the strength of the Spurs, and the way they played today, maybe in their opinion, this Spurs is no different from the Spurs last season."

"Reggie, do you mean the Thunder or the same strategy they did against the Spurs last season? If that's the case, then Scott Brooks' heart is too big. ”

"No, I didn't mean that, I mean, this season's Spurs and last season's Spurs are completely two different concepts, so the Thunder have to show stronger strength than the season and work harder to be able to beat the Spurs, otherwise what awaits them is defeat."

When the Thunder and Spurs took advantage of the pause to arrange tactics and strategies, several commentators on the sidelines also began to express their views on the game, but the Thunder's performance today was a little bad, and the Spurs' performance seemed to have improved a lot compared to the Warriors series.

After some adjustments, Scott Brooks not only changed the strategy on the court, but also made changes to the lineup, Scott Brooks replaced Kendrick Perkins with Kevin Martin, put Serge Ibaka as the center, and put Durant at the power forward position, Scott Brooks wanted to strengthen the Thunder's offense and change the situation on the court by adding a scoring point.

After Kevin Martin came on the court, the Thunder's offense did improve, Kevin Martin is also a good catch-and-shoot player, plus the Spurs' defensive energy is really limited, while mainly limiting Durant and Westbrook, they can't take out extra energy to focus on taking care of Kevin Martin.

Through a wave of counterattacks after Kevin Martin came on the court, the Thunder successfully narrowed the gap by 7 points at the end of the first quarter of the game, and the 7-point difference and the 11-point difference are definitely two concepts, so when the first quarter of the game ended, the expression on Scott Brooks' face standing on the sidelines was also a lot easier, but Scott Brooks also knew that the more difficult test was just beginning.