Thunder vs. Warriors Preview: Here We Go Again

The sky is turning a little grey around Oklahoma City lately. It hasn't fallen yet, but don't rule it out.

The Thunder seem to have lost their way since the All Star break, losing five out of seven games, including one each to fellow "contenders" Cleveland, Golden State and the Clippers.

Each loss seems to provide a new reason for concern. The Cleveland loss was by 23 points at home on national TV. The Warriors loss came after 45 minutes of the Thunder's best ball of the season, only to end in agonizing heartbreak from 38 feet away. And the Clippers loss, perhaps the most embarrassing of all, came after holding a 22-point second-half lead to a team playing without Blake Griffin.

If you're judging simply based off of social media outrage, Wednesday's Clippers debacle takes the take. Twitter went nuclear as OKC turned the ball over, took bad shots and couldn't contain DeAndre Jordan in the final minutes. Kevin Durant even said that the Thunder were "fooling ourselves if we want to be a great team."

So where does OKC go from here? It's hard to believe that a group this talented and used to winning would just fold up shop. But fixing what ails them won't be easy, either. Mainly because no one can seem to diagnose the illness.

It's hard to see a trip to Golden State as a good thing at a time like this, but it can't hurt, right? I mean, no one expects Oklahoma City to win this game, even if Andre Iguodala can't suit up for the Dubs. So what happens if the Thunder play 48 minutes of angry, focused basketball and snap the Warriors' 43-game home winning streak one win shy of tying the '96 Bulls' record?

Only positive can come from a galvanizing win like that. The opportunity is out there to turn things around, yet the prevailing thought heading into Thursday is: "here we go again."