{"id":15120916,"date":"2026-05-25T20:17:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T00:17:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/sga-spurs-punched-us-in-our-face-early-in-game-4\/"},"modified":"2026-05-25T22:01:04","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T02:01:04","slug":"sga-spurs-punched-us-in-our-face-early-in-game-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/sga-spurs-punched-us-in-our-face-early-in-game-4\/","title":{"rendered":"SGA: Spurs 'punched us in our face early' in Game 4"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Oklahoma City Thunder got off to another slow start Sunday against the San Antonio Spurs. However, they were unable to erase an early deficit this time, falling 103-82 in Game 4 to even the Western Conference finals at two games apiece.<\/p>\n

“They just punched us in our face early,” Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander<\/a> told reporters postgame, including ESPN’s Tim MacMahon<\/a>. “I think they just did a good job of being the aggressors. They were in us – forcing turnovers, being physical.”<\/p>\n

San Antonio jumped out to a 23-8 advantage within the first eight minutes of Game 4. Isaiah Hartenstein<\/a> was the only Thunder player to score during that span, while the rest of the team shot 0-for-6 from the field. The Spurs built a 15-0 lead to open Game 3, but OKC battled back and ultimately won Friday’s contest.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

Oklahoma City’s 82 total points on 33% shooting Sunday, including a 6-of-33 effort from deep, was the team’s lowest output since scoring 79 points against the Memphis Grizzlies in December 2021.<\/p>\n

San Antonio gave the Thunder a taste of their own medicine with 11 steals and 25 points off turnovers.<\/p>\n

Gilgeous-Alexander was limited to six points on 2-of-6 shooting when Stephon Castle<\/a> served as his primary defender, but the two-time MVP didn’t get much offensive help; Jalen Williams<\/a> and Ajay Mitchell<\/a> were sidelined due to injury.<\/p>\n

Hartenstein managed four more points after his quick start, while Chet Holmgren<\/a>‘s struggles continued with 10 points and three turnovers. Fellow starters Luguentz Dort<\/a> and Cason Wallace<\/a> combined for seven points on 3-of-10 shooting.<\/p>\n

“Two of our handlers, our creators, are out, but guys are good off the ball, and we played a fair amount of games this year with no handlers,” Gilgeous-Alexander said. “So, we’re a little bit used to that. But I mean, regardless, I think it’s just a snowball effect.<\/p>\n

“I think when you come out with the right energy, things like that work out and the offense has flow. And I don’t think we came out with the right energy today.”<\/p>\n

Game 5 of the Western Conference finals is set for Tuesday in Oklahoma City at 8:30 p.m. ET.<\/p>\n

Copyright © 2026 Score Media Ventures Inc. All rights reserved. Certain content reproduced under license.<\/em><\/small><\/p>\n

Source: Sports Basketball \u2013 The Score<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Oklahoma City Thunder got off to another slow start Sunday against the San Antonio Spurs. However, they were unable to erase an early deficit this time, falling 103-82 in Game 4 to even the Western Conference finals at two\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15120918,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[190],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15120916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270.jpg",640,480,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270-300x225.jpg",300,225,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270-620x465.jpg",620,465,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270.jpg",640,480,false],"large":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270.jpg",640,480,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270.jpg",640,480,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270.jpg",640,480,false],"post-thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270.jpg",640,480,false],"ignition_item":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270-640x446.jpg",640,446,true],"ignition_item_lg":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270.jpg",640,480,false],"ignition_article_media":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270-510x480.jpg",510,480,true],"ignition_minicart_item":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270-160x160.jpg",160,160,true],"profile_24":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270-24x24.jpg",24,24,true],"profile_48":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270-48x48.jpg",48,48,true],"profile_96":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270-96x96.jpg",96,96,true],"profile_150":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"profile_300":["https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/15120916-w640xh480_gettyimages-2277529270-300x300.jpg",300,300,true]},"author_info":{"display_name":"news.iNthacity","author_link":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/author\/atombo\/"},"category_info":"Basketball<\/a>","tag_info":"Basketball","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15120916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15120916"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15120916\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15120917,"href":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15120916\/revisions\/15120917"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15120918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15120916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15120916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inthacity.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15120916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}