When you win a game, then you consecutively win another, what's that called again?

Since Dec. 31st, the Oklahoma City Thunder are playing better than .500 basketball. After an 89-79 win over Detroit, OKC (8-33) now has won two in a row. That's right, TWO IN A ROW. Digest that for a minute. Swish it around, let it marinate.

How about more -- when Oklahoma City left Detroit after a tough last-second loss three weeks ago, the Thunder was 3-27. Now? Eight and thirty-three. One off the 1972-73 Sixers. Think anyone's checking ESPN's little tracker anymore? The Thunder are 5-5 in their last 10 and have won three out of four. And also, not the worst team in the league anymore in terms of wins -- OKC is now tied with Washington and the Clippers. One more: After starting 0-20 against plus .500 teams, OKC's first winning streak came against two teams a combined 13 games over.

The first seven minutes of the fourth sealed the deal. How? Because OKC started the last frame on a 15-0 run and Detroit (22-16) didn't score until there was 6:13 left. The Pistons were ice cold, missing their first eight shots of the fourth. Detroit was outworked all night, evidenced by the 52-35 rebounding edge in favor of the Thunder. Here's a crazy stat: Detroit didn't grab an offensive rebound until there was under four minutes left in the third quarter. Overall, OKC pulled down 14 offensive boards to the Pistons' five. Over the Thunder's last five games, they're a +73 on the glass. As Brian Davis would say, wow.

And think about this one -- the Pistons missed five straight free throws at one point in the third, but get this: Detroit was 3-8 from the line overall. That's it. Three for eight. And it wasn't like Detroit just shot the ball poorly or turned it over a ridiculous amount. The Pistons hit 46 percent and only gave it up nine times. No Piston scored more than 18 points. The pace wasn't even that slow tonight, but OKC's defense was great, giving up a season-low 79 points. In the second half, Detroit scored just 33 points. Wow, again.

You look at the box score and you see Jeff Green's miserable shooting night going an awful 2-16 from the field and you'd think he didn't have the best game. But as far as I'm concerned, he's the player of the night. He was huge on the glass, grabbing 14 rebounds, he dished five assists and he was an absolute force defensively. Look at Green's +/- tonight, an awesome +17. And he wasn't visibly frustrated with his poor shooting night. He kept working, kept driving and kept playing hard. That's a wonderful thing.

Speaking of the +/-, the bench guys were great as Earl Watson had a +12, Chris Wilcox had a +13 and Kyle Weaver a +10. Great production from the pine tonight, especially from Wilcox who had 17 and 11. And Desmond Mason had 11 and 11 from his shooting guard position and played excellent defense on Rip Hamilton.

Russell Westbrook finally had a rookie night. About dang time. He was 2-10, scored five, had six assists and played just 27 minutes, but he was actually really good. Because the Pistons' offensive catalyst, Rodney Stuckey, didn't score until there was under a minute left in the third and just had three points overall. But how about that little head-fake, fake pass, up-and-under he pulled on Rasheed Wallace in the third quarter? Or that near monster dunk over the entire Pistons team toward the end of the game? Two sweet moves from RW, even on a bad offensive night.

Here's how good OKC was as a team tonight - it's been six paragraphs and I haven't even mentioned Kevin Durant and his electric 32-point offensive showcase. He scored 12 in the first, four in the second, 10 in the third and six in the fourth. He was 14-21 from the field and 2-3 from downtown. He grabbed six rebounds and only turned it over three times. In other words, maybe his most complete line of the season. But one thing that impressed me more than anything was a sequence late in the second quarter. Westbrook drove and kicked out to Durant who was at the top of the key wide open for three. Tayshaun Prince was closing on him and instead of taking a good look, Durant swung the ball to Green in the corner who was open and knocked down the triple. KD has got it -- he's a superstar and an elite scorer, but he understands being a teammate first. He had his entire game working, but he didn't force anything. It came to him and he made it look easy. I don't care what he says -- he deserves to be an All-Star.

This is the team we thought we were going to see. Competitive, gritty and a group of youngsters that are talented, but raw. The NBA season is definitely a marathon -- these types of games happen for contenders. The Pistons were flat and got outplayed and outworked. But that doesn't make it any less awesome. Especially when at one point we were looking at a 1-16 team, then 2-24, then 3-29. Now they've won two in a row and have another winnable home game against Miami -- another plus .500 team. And one more gives OKC, (deep breath), win No. 9. That's right.

OKC gets the Heat Sunday night at 6 p.m. at the Ford.

Pistons vs. Thunder: Pre-game view

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Detroit Pistons (22-15) vs. Oklahoma City Thunder (7-33)
Friday, Jan. 16
Ford Center
Oklahoma City, OK
7:00 PM CST

TV: FS Oklahoma (Cox 37, HD 722)
Radio: WWLS The Sports Animal (98.1 FM, 640 AM)

View from the other side: Piston Powered

Another chance at revenge. I'm not even going to say anything about starting a win-streak, uh, nevermind.

Everybody knows it, but I'll say it: The Pistons better come into the Ford Center ready to play. The record says 7-33, but you better treat the Thunder like a 33-7 team or you're going to walk out with your tail between your legs and your beat writers will be saying things like, "Embarrassing loss for Detroit to the worst team in the history of man," and "If there's one thing Detroit can take with them, besides a humiliating loss to a bunch of kindergartners, it's the dust and cow poop that's all over Oklahoma." But seriously, the point is there -- bring your lunch pale to Loud City or be prepared to get rolled.

You'd assume the Thunder's confidence would be off the charts and tonight they'll come in fired up and clicking. But I actually fear that the opposite may happen. I could see a flat team, feeling some sort of weird sense of entitlement coming out and playing bad ball. The thing about OKC is that while confidence is one of the best things in all of sport, second to that is playing with a chip on your shoulder. The Thunder need to realize they haven't earned anything yet and haven't won anything yet. They need to add confidence to the disrespect they've felt and play their hearts out for 48 minutes and see what happens.

But while I worry about that, I trust Scott Brooks will have them ready and will explain this to them. After all, he is an NBA coach. I'm sure he's been over that little theory before. But as for matchups, OKC matches Detroit well. As we know, the last time the two teams played it took a buzzer beater to down the Thunder in Detroit. The Thunder has been playing well, and especially well at home. Russell Westbrook, well, no need to talk about what he's doing well. He's just been awesome. He can handle anything Allen Iverson/Rodney Stuckey has and more than likely, Westbrook will be able to get to the rim and get his shot whenever he wants it.

Such a huge key is how the three Thunder stars play. Against the Jazz, Westbrook had 22, Jeff Green 23 and Kevin Durant 21. Add in Nick Collison and Nenad Krsitc's solid play and there's a formula to get a win. But against a good team loaded with good players, you can't have just a couple parts functioning. Things need to be clicking for the role players and the stars.

Depending on how you view sports trends, you can look at this game two ways:
1) The Pistons have an eight-game winning streak over the Thunder franchise.
2) The Pistons have lost three straight, with the last two being against Charlotte (six-game winning streak over the Bobcats snapped) and Indiana (eight-game winning streak snapped).

It's been four years since Detroit has lost four in a row, which leads one to believe the Pistons would play well tonight. They've lost two games against sub-par opponents and obviously don't want to continue that against the Thunder. But then again, maybe the Pistons are in a lull and this is a good time to catch them. Like the Jazz, the Pistons are mediocre on the road, winning just 10 of 19 away from Detroit. Two wins in a row (crap, I said it) would be nice, but two wins in a row against a couple of playoff teams would be really nice.

UPDATE: Just came out that Nick Collison is questionable for tonight because of a stomach virus and Rasheed Wallace missed the Pistons' shootaround today because of illness.

So close, yet soooooo close

As one commenter said, the Thunder were only down two at half and he expected them to lose by 8-12 points in the end. That's what I thought. That's what everybody thought. Especially against a good Pistons squad, in their building nonetheless.

And at a few points, it looked like it was happening. Oklahoma City was down by 14 and appeared to be fading, but an 11-0 run pulled the Thunder to within three. While that run was great and all, the following few minutes showed just how far this team has come. In the past, the valiant comeback attempts came up short and by "short," I mean well short. But OKC fought and scrapped and scraped and with Joe Smith's 21-footer, the game was tied at 88-88 with under 20 seconds left.

But then Allen Iverson did what he was supposed to. He challenged Russell Westbrook and hit an impossible leaning jumper with 0.02 seconds left. But again, OKC wasn't throwing it in yet. A lob to Jeff Green was executed perfectly, well, except for Green actually putting the ball in the hoop. But still, the play was ran just how Scott Brooks wanted, but it's kind of hard to place the ball when you only have time to put a pinky on it.

Once again, all you have to do to find out why the Thunder came up short is look at the details. Free throw shooting once again failed them. 63 percent from the line just isn't going to cut it. The hidden points that you missed out on just because of a lack of concentration or whatever the reason, can't be excused.

While Kevin Durant was once again good, the 1-6 from three concerns me a tad. He's been shooting the three-ball so well lately (over 50 percent this month), I fear he's going to have a lapse and get carried away with the moneyball and start chucking like he did the first half of his rookie season. But I think he's come a long way in that. For the most part, the six shots were good looks that just didn't go in. He didn't force it and was still 9-19 from the field. But Durant has been scary good lately - his 26 Friday night made it nine straight outings with over 20 points and six with 25 or more. I'm excited with where his game is going.

And Russell Westbrook should pick up a few slam dunk votes tonight with his two ridunkulous (see what I did there?) rim-rockers. That second one with the little cross and dive into the lane was a thing of beauty until he cocked and assaulted the iron. Very awesome. Brian Davis sounded like threw up on the microphone as he stammered to get the superlatives out after it.



But honestly, outside of the poor foul shooting, I don't see how anyone could complain or bash after this one. Seems to me this is one of those, snap your fingers and say "shucks" type of games. Even if OKC was 20-9 instead of 3-26 coming in, losing to a top five time in the East in their gym on a last-second shot is nothing to be ashamed of. The idea is, in two years when this group has completely matured, these type of games will have been integral in getting the Thunder to the point of being a winning ball club.

Next up is a winnable one in Washington against the 4-23 Wizards. These kind of games concern me because 1) Nothing is a gimme for this group and 2) I hate expecting a 3-27 team to win, because that typically leads to disappointment. But that's what will be the case Saturday night in Washington. If this so-called improvement is really happening, then the team should go out and win one against a sub-par opponent. But again, three and twenty-seven. There's no "should's" involved with the Thunder except "should lose."

Thunder at Pistons: Pre-gamer

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Oklahoma City Thunder (3-27) vs. Detroit Pistons (15-11)
Friday, December 26
The Palace of Auburn Hills
Detroit, Michigan
7:00 CST

TV: FS Oklahoma (Cox 37)
Radio: WWLS The Sports Animal (98.1 FM, 640 AM)

The one area OKC really has an advantage tonight? The glass. The Pistons are 25th in the league in rebounding averaging just 39.8 a game. The Thunder on the other hand have been rebounding extremely well lately, outrebounding seven of their last eight opponents, averaging 45.3 boards during that stretch. Jeff Green has been rebounding much better (and he should be), snatching 24 boards the past two games. Chris Wilcox had a season-high 12 against Atlanta. Even Kevin Durant has been hitting the glass a little better lately.

But other than that, what hope is there for tonight? Though the Pistons are an average 11-11 since trading for Allen Iverson, they still are one of the top five or six teams in the East. Rodney Stuckey had a career high 40 against Chicago the other night, Tayshaun Prince will give KD major problems tonight and Rasheed Wallace is a matchup nightmare.

Like I mentioned the Hawks preview, somehow I'm kind of getting excited about this team again, though it's still 3-26. It's awesome watching Durant operate at such an efficient level (25.6 ppg, 7.1 rpg and 51.1 percent from three in December), and Russell Westbrook is continuing to mature and improve. I'm still not totally sure if Jeff Green is "getting it" because he's still relatively inconsistent. And even the Nenad Krstic signing has injected a little life because help in on the way and it's pretty good help. The win against Toronto helped get people off OKC's back with the whole "worst team ever" talk and highlighted the improvement under Scott Brooks.

All that aside, we all know how tonight will turn out. The Thunder is likely looking at 3-27 and that's just not good for the first 30 games of a season. But each game I don't have the complete and total "no chance" feeling like I did a month ago. Granted, it's only like a one percent chance feeling, but I'm saying there's a chance.