Trail Blazers’ hope to replicate Oklahoma City Thunder’s rebuilding blueprint: ‘I love what they’ve been able to do’

On Sunday night, the rebuilding Portland Trail Blazers found themselves up against a type of team they hope to become in the future but were shown just how far they are from reaching that level.

The Oklahoma City Thunder won 134-91 at the Moda Center. Although it’s early in the season, they appear to have reached another gear after going 40-42 last season to qualify for the play-in round of the postseason.

The Thunder (10-4) enter Monday with the second-best winning percentage (.714) in the NBA’s Western Conference and are likely on their way to securing their first winning record since 2019-20 (44-28) when they last qualified for the playoffs.

That type of turnaround provides a road map to success that these young Blazers should aspire to replicate.

“It definitely gives us hope,” Blazers forward Jabari Walker said following Sunday’s loss. “They’re young guys. We’re young guys. I think we have a bunch of skilled young guys just like they do. I think it just shows that we’re not too far off. Just a couple little switches that can turn into major differences.”

A lot must go right for the Blazers in the coming years for them to realistically be close to where the Thunder seem to be headed.

The Thunder, after years of trades and quality drafts, are young, long and athletic. Not to mention, they’re equipped with one budding superstar and a rising star who could prove to be championship difference-makers.

The Blazers, like the Thunder did when trading off Paul George, Russell Westbrook and then Chris Paul and Steven Adams, have entered a rebuild phase after moving CJ McCollum in 2022 and then last season honoring Damian Lillard’s trade request after he determined that contending in Portland wasn’t going to happen.

The results thus far haven’t been pretty.

Portland lost its seventh consecutive game on Sunday to fall to 3-10. But that’s part of the plan. The Thunder, after all, went 46-108 over two seasons (2020-22) after starting their rebuild.

That fact, along with the bounty of draft picks acquired, led to the selections of lottery picks Josh Giddey (2021), Chet Holmgren (2022) and Jalen Williams (2022), to name just some of the young talent the franchise has placed around Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who finished fifth in last season’s MVP voting.

“They’re just a balanced team,” Blazers coach Chauncey Billups said prior to Sunday’s game.

“They’ve done it right and they are young and they compete every single night. They have so many different players that can lead the team. I love what they’ve been able to do and coach (Mark Daigneault) has done a terrific job.”

According to Billups, he had marveled at how the Thunder attacked the paint and played so well together a couple of years ago.

Oklahoma City Thunder guard Josh Giddey, left, drives to the basket against Portland Trail Blazers center Deandre Ayton, right, during the first half of an NBA basketball game in Portland, Ore., Sunday, Nov. 19, 2023. (AP Photo/Steve Dykes) APAP

“I said, man, when they start to grow up a little bit and they start to add, that team is going to be dangerous,” Billups said.

The turning point for both franchises came late last year. The Blazers played back-to-back games at the Thunder on December 19 and 20. Portland was favored in both games, with the first matchup being the night Lillard surpassed Clyde Drexler as the Blazers’ all-time leading scorer.

Portland entered the series at 17-13. The Thunder were 12-18. Oklahoma City won the first game, 123-121 and the second game 101-98.

From that point on, the Thunder went 26-24 the rest of the season while the Blazers went 16-34.

Losing and securing draft capital is one thing. Hitting on the right picks as the Thunder have done is another.

Portland’s current rebuild actually got started in 2022 after Lillard underwent surgery and was lost for the season, leading to the team tanking and drafting Shaedon Sharpe, 20, with the No. 7 pick in the 2022 daft. Then, last summer, rather than trade the No. 3 pick (begotten again by tanking) in an effort to build around Lillard, the Blazers chose Scoot Henderson, 19.

The Blazers will assuredly add another lottery pick talent to the roster next summer to give them three super young building blocks. It’s imperative that Sharpe, Henderson and whomever they select in 2024 develop and thrive.

Billups has compared Sharpe to Phoenix Suns All-Star Devin Booker. Blazers general manager Joe Cronin called Henderson “transcendent.”

An All-Star shooting guard and a generational point guard would certainly get the Blazers on the right track. The rebuild could also be boosted by center Deandre Ayton exceeding his solid play in Phoenix and maybe getting lucky with a key acquisition or two.

In the meantime, Billups is trying to establish an identity such as the Thunder did while trying to build around Gilgeous-Alexander. Billups, since arriving in 2021, has worked to get his team to improve on paint touches in order to attack the rim and ultimately create better three-point looks.

The Thunder, Walker said, play their offense almost to perfection.

“It’s like they are playing pickup basketball,” he said. “They’re so hard to guard because you don’t know who’s gonna be the man that day. You know Shai is going to be the head of the snake, but other guys just contribute so much.”

The Thunder’s chemistry, Walker said, is something the Blazers are working to replicate. But with so many new and young faces, that will take time.

“Sometimes we play against a team and you see an opening, but the ball may not get there,” Walkers said. “But with (the Thunder), as soon as someone was open, the ball was there. Just seemed like the team is very unselfish. That’s very hard to guard.”

That’s how the Thunder play and Gilgeous-Alexander is the perfect point guard to lead that charge because he thrives on attacking the rim and getting to the free-throw line, whereas Lillard thrived off hitting threes and occasionally getting to the paint.

Henderson, the Blazers believe, could become their version of a rim-attacking and pass-spraying point guard. Once the team gets back Anfernee Simons and Malcolm Brogdon, along with Jerami Grant and Sharpe, they could have a solid crew of shooters.

But as of Monday, the Thunder leads the NBA in three-point shooting (41%) while the Blazers rank last (30.5%).

A lot must go right for this to all work out for the Blazers and the Thunder appear to be a team they will be chasing.

“I see some similarities with where we kind of are and how they’ve built their thing and where they were,” Billups said. “A couple of years ago, they went really young and kind of built it right.”

And in doing so, provided a road map for the Blazers to follow.