The Philadelphia 76ers are playing their best basketball and with that are on the current longest winning streak of the season.
That Oklahoma City Thunder seem unconcerned.
Kevin Durant will remain on his minutes restriction of 30 in his second game back from foot surgery when the Thunder take on the 1-17 Sixers Friday night, reports Anthony Slater of the Oklahoman.
Kevin Durant will still be on a minute restriction of about 30 tonight against Philadelphia.
— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) December 5, 2014
That shouldn’t be a problem. In fact, if he needs to play the full 30 I’d be more concerned. And the Thunder are right to not push too hard on the reigning MVP and the guy they need to be right for the long haul.
That said, Thunder need wins. Now. They need to go 44-20 the rest of the way to get to the 49 wins that was the playoff cutoff in the West last season (and it likely will be in that ballpark again this season). They can’t go out and not care against the Sixers, no matter how bad they are.
Kevin Durant asked if it'll be hard not to overlook the 1-17 Sixers tonight: "Nah, feels like we're 1-17 too."
— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) December 5, 2014
The Thunder enter a 10 game stretch now where they can make up ground facing teams such as lowly Philadelphia, as well as Detroit, Milwaukee (not a pushover), Minnesota, and the LA Lakers. There are some challenging games in that stretch — Cleveland, Golden State — and one game they should real circle on the calendar: Phoenix. That is the current eight seed and the team they need to catch in the Western Conference.
Like Durant said, they can’t look past anybody right now, they need to win about 70 percent of their games the rest of the way.
