It’s a dark time for both the Portland Trail Blazers and Oklahoma City Thunder.
The two struggling teams played against each other on Monday night, with the Thunder eventually coming out on top, 134-131.
Fans expecting to see some of the biggest names from each team definitely walked away unimpressed.
In fact, fans expecting to see anyone they really know were certainly disappointed.
That’s because the Trail Blazers and Thunder both employed squads of virtual unknowns in Monday’s game.
These are your starters for this evening.
Thunder:
Theo Maledon
Aaron Wiggins
Vit Krejci
Aleksej Pokusevski
Isaiah RobyBlazers:
Brandon Williams
CJ Elleby
Keon Johnson
Elijah Hughes
Drew Eubanks— Joe Mussatto (@joe_mussatto) March 29, 2022
This was confirmation that both teams know the season is all but over and they’re ready to throw in the towel, focus on tanking for the rest of the season, and hopefully secure better draft picks.
The season is definitely, 100% done for these teams.
Better Luck Next Year
Most people expected this year to be rough for the Thunder – including the team’s front office.
They have been slowly but surely accumulating draft picks over the last couple of seasons and are looking to continue their rebuilding process.
As for the Blazers, this was supposed to be a huge season for them.
They kept Damian Lillard which was a huge relief and also had CJ McCollum and Jusuf Nurkic along with younger talent like Anfernee Simons.
But now Lillard is out for the rest of the season recovering from surgery, Nurkic is injured too, and McCollum has been traded to the New Orleans Pelicans.
The Blazers are in a rebuilding mode of their own but that means they are giving up on this season.
They’ll have to make some big moves in the months ahead if they hope to keep Lillard around longer.
It was said before this season but they really don’t have much more time before Lillard gives up on this team and demands a trade.
NEXT: Jusuf Nurkic Receives Hefty Fine For Throwing A Fan's Phone