Nerlens Noel has found a niche as a rim runner for the Oklahoma City Thunder offense.
Of Noel’s 174 made field goals this season, 106 were dunks. Of those dunks, 61 were alley-oop finishes, and he had two other alley-oop finishes that were layups.
Despite playing less than 20 minutes per game, he was part of two of the top 13 alley-oop duos in the league this season.
Chris Paul brought a piece of Lob City with him to Oklahoma City, completing 33 alley-oop passes to Noel, which was the sixth-most for a duo in the NBA.
Dennis Schroder connected for an alley-oop 19 times with Noel, the 13th-most in the league, according to data compiled by NBA Wire’s Bryan Kalbrosky.
Per-36 minutes, the Paul-Noel combination looks even brighter.
With 2.18 alley-oop completions per 36, the duo ranks second in the league, behind the Brooklyn Nets’ Spencer Dinwiddie and DeAndre Jordan.
Schroder-Noel had 0.93 alley-oops per 36 minutes, which was tied for 13th in the league.
With 7.7 points per game on 68.5% shooting and 4.9 rebounds, 1.0 steal and 1.5 blocks in 18.4 minutes per game, Noel proved to be a solid rotation player for the Thunder.
With his $2 million contract expiring this offseason, he can point to several stats to indicate his importance to the team as the Thunder consider re-signing him.
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