Carmelo Anthony “open minded,” “accepting” of new offensive role

Earlier in the season, late in games Carmelo Anthony felt forgotten — standing in the corner as a kick-out option, waving his arms and waiting his turn to go one-on-one. The Thunder offense was some of the games great scorers playing next to each other, not with each other in ways that forces hard choices upon a defense.

Fast forward to Friday night, when the lowly Atlanta Hawks battled back to take a four-point lead in the fourth quarter. One of the Thunder’s go-to plays down the stretch was Anthony setting a pick for Russell Westbrook then popping out to the arc. It forced tough decisions on the Hawks who could not handle it. OKC got the win and Anthony finished with 24 points and hit 7-of-12 from three.

It’s a different role for him, Anthony was always the guy with the ball in his hands in clutch — and non-clutch — moments in the game. He’s accepting it, as he and coach Billy Donovan said postgame Friday. Quotes via Royce Young of ESPN.

“One hundred percent,” Donovan said when asked if that was the ideal kind of offensive game for Anthony. “I give him a lot of credit because this is different for him, and he’s really been open-minded about trying to do whatever he can do to help the team. And as a coach, you really appreciate someone that’s been in the game such a long time and established himself as a 10-time All-Star, 14 years in the league, one of the all-time greats, that he’s willing to look at ways that he can do things a little bit differently to help our team.”

“I think for me it’s just a matter of accepting that role. That’s all it is,” Anthony said. “Realizing that’s what it’s going to be, these are the type of shots I’m going to get, this is the type of offense we’re going to be running and accepting that, and working on that role. That’s something that I’ve kind of been doing over the past week, is allowing myself to accept that role and do whatever I gotta do to make this team win.”

The Thunder have won three in a row — with an offense that is fifth in the NBA in that stretch — and five of six. The calls for patience, that their offense would start to come around (and catch up with their already elite defense) are proving to be correct. Anthony finding his role in the offense, and Westbrook taking on more of it, is working for the team.

The hot streak of the Thunder will be put to the test Christmas Day against the Rockets (who have stumbled to two ugly losses in a row). The biggest problem for the Thunder going forward is the hole they dug themselves with this start. OKC is currently tied for the fifth seed with Denver and is two games back of Minnesota for the four seed, but that’s as high as they can climb. They are not catching the Spurs at this point. If the Thunder are the four seed they will have a tough first-round matchup (likely Minnesota or Denver, two good and improving young teams) then get Golden State or Houston in the second round. If that’s where the season ends, will it be enough to keep this roster together?