On March 21, the Oklahoma City Thunder rolled out a starting lineup against the Houston Rockets that had an average age of 21 years and 36 days. It was just a few weeks older than the youngest starting lineup of all time.
On Saturday, the Thunder outdid themselves. With Darius Bazley back from injury and in the starting lineup, Oklahoma City broke its mark and the league record.
Theo Maledon (19 years, 9 months, 30 days), Lu Dort (21 years, 11 months, 23 days), Aleksej Pokusevski (19 years, 3 months, 16 days), Bazley (20 years, 9 months, 30 days) and Moses Brown (21 years, 5 months, 29 days) set the record for the youngest starting five in NBA history.
With an average age of 20 years, 8 months and 6 days, the Thunder surpassed the Phoenix Suns, who on March 23, 2017 played a group that had an average of 21 years and 14 days old.
Like those Suns, the Thunder were steamrolled on Saturday. OKC’s 117-93 loss to the Philadelphia 76ers wasn’t as bad as the Suns’ 126-98 loss to the Brooklyn Nets, who at that point were the worst team in the league, but it wasn’t a pretty game.
With that said, the Thunder lineup of three weeks ago — now the third youngest in league history — is still the youngest lineup to win a game.
That probably will not be the third-youngest for long. Oklahoma City plays again Tuesday, and barring the worsening of Pokusevski’s arm injury, should roll out the same group.
At that point, the lineup would be on average three days older, the second-youngest mark in the league.
This post originally appeared on OKCThunderWire. Follow us on Facebook!
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