National Basketball Association roundup: Thunder’s Durant, Pelicans’ Davis injured in victories

Augustin and Kanter were magnificent in the pick and roll together. Dion Waiters scored 25 points for the Thunder, who had lost three of their past four games and now are 5-3. “Hamstrings are really tricky and we want this guy to be back for the long haul”, Fisher told the NY Post. The Thunder catch a bit of a break as those are five games Westbrook and the supporting cast are capable of winning without Durant. But the Wizards shot just 39.2 percent from the field and couldn’t do enough to keep OKC from getting comfortable on offense.

Much of the hoopla that surrounded Kevin Durant’s return to the nation’s capital in January was absent from the Verizon Center this time around.

Despite playing at home, the Wizards fell behind early, trailing 37-23 after the first quarter and never really recovered as they were playing without their top scorer in Bradley Beal, who was suffering from a minor shoulder injury. Marcin Gortat pulled down one single defensive rebound in 27 minutes, which led to him being called out (in spirit if not in name) by Wittman in the postgame.

Meanwhile, a few early foul trouble got Turkish center Enes Kanter into the game early.

Late in the second quarter, Durant came down awkwardly after drawing a foul and immediately grabbed at his left leg. He made two free throws and remained in the game for the final two minutes of the half. We still have the same guys we’ve had the last couple years. We can’t blame turnovers tonight for defending, and we don’t defend.

As Temple pointed out, the Wizards’ roster is populated with the same players who were part of one the league’s best defensive teams last season. Again, that starts with offense, I think. Looking at our game in Atlanta, when we got them 5-on-5 in the half court, we were pretty good, defensively-4-on-2 we weren’t real good, 3-on-1 we weren’t really good.

Pelicans 120, Mavericks 105 – Anthony Davis scored 17 points before leaving at halftime with a bruised right hip as host New Orleans won its first game of the season. 500 for the first time since dropping the season opener previous year in South Beach.

Lin finished with 19 points on six of 11 shooting to go along with three assists and a rebound.