Jurassic Parked: Raptors Stop Streaking Thunder

Oklahoma City's nine-game winning steak and perfect home record came to a halt on Sunday, as the Thunder fell to Toronto 104-98 at Chesapeake Energy Arena.

Sunday, December 22nd 2013, 11:02 pm

By: News 9


All great things must come to an end.

Oklahoma City's perfect home record and nine-game winning streak came to a screeching halt on Sunday evening at Chesapeake Energy Arena, as the Thunder laid a dinosaur-sized egg with a 104-98 loss to the Toronto Raptors.

A night after dominating one of the league's best teams in a comfortable road victory at San Antonio, Oklahoma City's performance was on the opposite end of the spectrum in nearly every way against a sub-.500 Raptor squad.

OKC's starters got outplayed, foul-trouble caused lineup issues and, simply put, the Thunder just couldn't get the ball to go in the basket.

Oklahoma City (22-5) shot 36.8 percent from the floor for the game and scored only 14 points on 5-of-24 shooting in the fourth quarter after appearing poised to pull out the victory following a dominating third period.

Oklahoma City surged ahead with a 24-4 run during the third, giving the Thunder an 82-71 lead but it wouldn't last. Following a Westbrook jumper that gave OKC a 93-88 advantage with six minutes left in the game, Toronto answered with a 10-0 and would never trail again.

To the Thunder's credit, despite its abysmal shooting, the team managed to fight back and knot the score up at 98-all but Toronto held OKC scoreless the final 1:39.

It just wasn't the Thunder's night and Kyle Lowry sealed its fate with a pair of game-clinching free throws with 9.8 seconds remaining to hand OKC its first loss since Dec. 4 and first home loss in 14 games at The Peake.

Russell Westbrook led the Thunder with 27 points and Kevin Durant added 24 but both shot relatively poorly and did a healthy amount of their scoring from the foul line, combining to go 22-of-23 from the stripe.

No other Thunder player managed to reach double figures, lowlighted by a season-worst outing from Reggie Jackson, who scored six points on a woeful 1-for-11 from the floor.

Kyle Lowry led Toronto (11-14) with 22 points, while Amir Johnson and DeMar DeRozan each added 17 points for the Raptors, who moved into first place in the Atlantic Division with the win.

While it wasn't a memorable night for the Thunder, there were a handful of positives to come out of the loss. Oklahoma City entered the contest second in the NBA in free-throw percentage at 81.8 percent but it managed to take even more advantage than usual from the charity stripe, connecting on 97.2 percent on 35-of-36 shooting.

Also, the Thunder defense certainly wasn't the problem, as OKC held the Raptors to a season-worst 13 points in the third quarter and held Toronto to just 39.6 percent shooting overall. Oklahoma City also recorded seven blocks and seven steals.

The Thunder will have a chance to bounce back on Christmas Day with a 1:30 p.m. tip against the New York Knicks in Madison Square Garden.

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