What Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said after Spurs loss

The Oklahoma City Thunder saw its 16-game winning streak end in Saturday night’s 111-109 loss to the San Antonio Spurs.

The Thunder held a 49-46 lead at halftime, but were unable to hold off the Spurs, who had four players score 20 points or more.

“When you play close games, you’re not going to win them all,” Thunder head coach Mark Daigneault said. “I thought we put ourselves in a tough position there, playing from behind down the stretch.”

Oklahoma City gave up 65 second-half points in Saturday’s loss. The Spurs made 13 3-pointers and had 40 points in the paint.

“Sometimes it comes down to make or miss plays,” Daigneault said. “We made some good passes out of double teams and stuff like that, so I thought our offensive attacks were okay. We didn’t get a ton of stop down at the other end.”

Guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander led Oklahoma City with 29 points on 12/23 shooting. He also added four rebounds and five assists but also had five turnovers. Daigneault said the Spurs did a good job defending Gilgeous-Alexander.

“There was a lot of controllable stuff we can learn from that game that wasn’t where we’d like it to be,” Daigneault said.

The Thunder struggled from 3-point range, shooting 9/37 (24%) from behind the arc.

“It wasn’t our sharpest night,” Daigneault said. “Certainly, our attacks weren’t as sharp as they’ve normally been.”

It was the first loss for the Thunder since a 121-119 defeat to the Portland Trail Blazers on Nov. 5.