The Philadelphia 76ers defeated the Oklahoma City Thunder 108-104 at the Chesapeake Energy Arena on Saturday, putting an end to their embarrassing record of losing 19 straight games to OKC.

Philadelphia's Tobias Harris scored the court's highest 32 points. Ben Simmons had a triple-double of 11 points, 13 rebounds, and 11 assists. Jimmy Butler dropped 20 points, eight rebounds, and eight assists. The other two of their first-lineup, Jonah Bolden and J.J. Reddick put down respectively 14 and 12 points.

Russell Westbrook had another triple-double of 23 points, 11 rebounds, and 11 assists. Jerami Grant shared Oklahoma City's most 23 points with him. Steven Adams dropped a double-double of 11 points and 14 rebounds. Markieff Morris and Dennis Schroder scored 17 and 14 points respectively.

Both sides lacked one of their key players as the 76ers did not have Joel Embiid and the Thunder missed Paul George. The two teams chose totally different tactics in defense from the beginning. OKC continued their customary aggressive double-teaming, leaving more open shots for Philadelphia which explained why the visiting team led 4-1 in three-pointers in the first quarter.

By contrast, the 76ers had their center remain in the paint and gave a big step to Westbrook to test his unreliable shooting. When Westbrook drove towards the rim, Philadelphia's wingmen did not double team him but stood in his passing way to his teammates around the corner. Though sometimes Westbrook's pass could reach his teammate, he's not a reliable shooter and thus could not punish Philadelphia's defense.

Having trailed 26-37 in the first quarter, the Thunder enhanced their defense to leave their opponent fewer open three-pointers. Meanwhile, the 76ers grew careless in defense, which should give the home team an opportunity to narrow the score difference but OKC failed to do so because they continued to struggle with their offense, especially in shooting.

Philadelphia used the same tactic on Schroder, Oklahoma City's orchestrator from the bench, as what they did to stop Westbrook: Giving him one big step to let him shoot and standing close to OKC's inside men so they could not get easy alley-oops. Though the 76ers did not have enough opportunities around the 3-pt line in the second quarter, the opponent's defense moving out left them enough space to score easy points via back door play in the paint and maintain their 11-point lead (60-49).

The Thunder made two changes to their game from the second half. They moved Schroder to first-lineup for better passing and had Adam to stay under the rim. Moreover, Philadelphia continued to lose energy in the offense as they stopped moving and were unwilling to make extra passes. OKC finally took the opportunity to launch a 16-4 run to narrow the score difference down to two points. However, without reliable shooters, the team could not carry on their scoring trend and had to watch Philadelphia respond a 9-0 run before the game went to the last quarter.

The Thunder did one thing right in this game by increasing their intensity in defense, and that began to pay in Q4. Without Embiid, the 76ers did not have a qualified playmaker who could change the physical defense of OKC. Simmons could not shoot, Harris was not a great isolation player, and Butler had problems with maintaining high efficiency. The team soon fell into scoring drought while Oklahoma City began to catch up via transition offense.

Though OKC finally managed to tie the score 93-93, their decision of keeping Schroder on the court became a weakness exploited by the 76ers. 2.03-meter-tall Harris started to aim for 1.85-meter-tall Schroder in offense, and he soon scored eight points in a row while Butler added another two to make it a 10-0 run. Though the Thunder responded a 7-0 run, the team lacked good 3-pt shooters, which were the most important weapons for a team to catch up and had to accept a loss at home.

Thursday's game was good proof for how important George was to Oklahoma City. In defense, he's quick and big enough to guard anyone ranging from Position 1 to Position 4. Meanwhile, he's also fast enough for both double teaming the ball handler and interfering passes. More importantly, George was OKC's true solution when the team tried everything in the offense, his ability to make tough shots under defense already claimed multiple tough victories for the team this season.

Other games on Thursday included: (away teams come first)

Minnesota Timberwolves 115-122 Indiana Pacers

Golden State Warriors 96-103 Orlando Magic

Cleveland Cavaliers 125-118 New York Knicks

Miami Heat 118-121 Houston Rockets

Utah Jazz 111-104 Denver Nuggets