Aleksej Pokuševski had gotten his taste of the NBA over the first two months of the season. It was coming in morsel-sized stints of playing time in the Thunder’s rotation for about 17 minutes per night. In February, it became time for him to settle down for a whole meal’s worth of professional basketball action, allowing for longer rotations in the game, more responsibility on his shoulders and more freedom to grow into his game.
That was the backdrop for the Thunder’s decision to send Pokuševski to Orlando along with three others to compete with the Oklahoma City Blue in the G-League Bubble.