Oklahoma City - After spending the first seven games looking for solutions to various defensive aspects with the Denver Nuggets, the Oklahoma City Thunder did not make a smooth transition to the physical to human-to-person plan against Minnesota Timberwolves in the Western Conference Finals.

However, none of the NBA has a more defensive problem than the most important Thunder, a trend that continued in the first game on Tuesday, allowing Oklahoma City to overcome the creepy first half offense.

The Thunder won the championship with a 114-88 victory by converting the Timberwolves' 19 turnovers to 31 points.

"We're trying to play to our identity," said Oklahoma City superstar Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. "We're doing a great job in defense." Our defense certainly gave us life early in the game and kept us in it. ”

Oklahoma City was only four points behind at halftime, although only 44 points were scored, with 18 of them not making any mistakes.

"I just think it took us a second to calibrate our opponents, but our defense allowed us to do that," Thunder coach Mark Digneault said.

Oklahoma City's shooting tends to fluctuate, especially during the playoffs, but the Thunder have been the NBA's top defensive team. Oklahoma City scored the league's highest defense in the regular season, with only a huge profit - 2.5 points less than any other team per 100 games - and lifted it to another level in the playoffs.

In 12 playoff games, the Thunder allowed only 100.7 points per 100 games. The Timberwolves scored the second-brain defense this playoffs, allowing 107.8 points per 100 games.

But Oklahoma City's defense not only stopped. This is also one of the best ways to generate an attack from lightning.

ESPN Research said the Thunder averaged 25.3 turnovers during the playoffs, which was the most team in any postseason in the 1997 playoffs. Oklahoma City’s turnover scored 37 points in its Nuggets’ turnover in Game 7, and he joined the 2017 Golden State Warriors, the only team in the past 25 years to convert a turnover to at least 30 points in a row in the playoffs.

“We just got an amazing defensive team,” Thunder Reserve Alex Caruso said. "It's a collection of great individual defenders who also perform great team defense. Then, once we have a break, young legs, all these handsome guys are running (and) dunking."

Oklahoma City forced an NBA-high 18.3 turnovers in the playoffs, which is a growth in the regular season from the league-leading 17.0.

"The turnovers are by no means what we talk about," Daigneault said. "We talk about crowding around the ball. We talk about being aggressive in helping, trusting our help, trusting our plans, trusting teammates. When you really do that, it often creates turnovers. But, it also produces tough shots, unremitting shots. That's what we try to do.

Oklahoma City found its groove on the offensive end after shooting only 37.5% of the first half. The Thunder scored 70 points on 61.9% shooting percentage in the second half.

Oklahoma City took command in the third quarter, when Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams surpassed the Timberwolves themselves. The Thunder All-Star duo was able to shoot 21 from 21 in the first half, but Jill Alexander and Williams hit 21 points on 15 shots in the third quarter, while Oklahoma City led by double-digits.

Except for power forward Julius Randle who scored 20 of 28 points in the first half, the Timberwolves never established any offensive rhythm.

The Thunder kept the Timberwolves' shooting percentage at 34.9%, including 15 of the 51 (29.4%) in the 3-point range. Minnesota scored only 20 points on the paint list, the fewest team in its first playoff game against the Los Angeles Lakers in the 2004 Western Conference Finals.

“There are two aspects of basketball,” Thunder power forward/center Chet Homegren said. "If you just want to play one side, you have to do a great job and don't want to count on that, especially in the playoffs. Especially against good teams and great players like them on the other side. You really have to try to give yourself a chance on both ends and if one side doesn't go well, you can really work on the other end."