Wizards defense top 10 since the All-Star break. Seriously.

In Friday’s game against the Oklahoma City Thunder, Scott Brooks pleaded for his team to wake up. The Wizards led by a couple of scores, but the coach was unhappy with the way the Thunder’s guards were getting to the basket. 

“I told them during one timeout, ‘Some of our defensive footwork — I can go by you guys,’” Brooks said. 

When the Wizards got back to the locker room at halftime, Brooks and his staff pulled up clips and pointed out defensive mistakes. The players got the message: The Thunder shot just 41% in the second half as the Wizards cruised to a 129-109 win. 

The rebuilding Thunder (20-40) are by no means an offensive juggernaut, but the Wizards again locked down on the defensive end — a new and surprising trend for a team ranked 29th in defense a year ago in the franchise’s worst-ever defensive showing. 

But this season, as the Wizards have racked up wins to get back into playoff position, they’re showing the rest of the NBA they’re no longer pushovers.  

In fact, the Wizards now rank 17th on the season in defensive rating, allowing just 112 points per 100 possessions. That’s respectable, but dig further and you’ll realize that entering Sunday’s game against the Cleveland Cavaliers, Washington has actually been the eighth-best defense since the All-Star break with a 109.8 defensive rating. 

“Our guys, I wouldn’t say they’ve bought in because they were always trying to buy in,” Brooks said. “We just didn’t have a rhythm early in the season. The COVID. The injuries. Now, we seem to have enough healthy guys at the right time.”

The Wizards have made adjustments to get better results. Brooks tightened the rotation, opting to play nine players instead of 10 on most nights — allowing players to build a rhythm with more minutes, Brooks said. The Wizards have also greatly benefited from their additions at center — Alex Len, Robin Lopez and Daniel Gafford. 

None of the three were on Washington’s roster last season. And Len and Gafford are in-season pickups. Brooks said the bigs are making an impact even when not altering shots. They’re doing so just by clogging the paint — forcing teams to look for a shot elsewhere, Brooks said. 

According to NBA Stats, teams facing the Wizards take just 33.2% of their shots within six feet of the basket — the 10th-best mark in the league. In other words, the Wizards are doing a good job of preventing teams from getting easy shots at the rim.

“I’m just coming in here doing what I do,” said Gafford, who is averaging two blocks per game since the Wizards acquired him at the trade deadline. “Having a guy come in like me that’s defense first, offense second, that can be a big thing for a team. I’m not coming in here and acting like ‘I’m the change, I’m this, I’m that.’ I’m just coming in here and playing my game.”

Washington is also efficient at limiting teams from taking 3-pointers. Teams take the ninth-fewest shots beyond the arc per game when facing the Wizards at 32.9, according to the NBA stats portal. Teams are still hitting a relatively high percentage — 37.9, second-highest in the NBA — but the Wizards are efficient at running teams off the 3-point line. 

Bradley Beal likes to say that playing defense comes down to attitude. If the Wizards don’t take pride in their matchup, then they won’t make stops, he says. Beal sees that happening now. 

Last week, for instance, Russell Westbrook helped limit Stephen Curry, who went just 7-of-25 for 18 points on an off night. But just as important for the Wizards, they adapted in the fourth quarter. They shut down Jordan Poole and Kelly Oubre, two Golden State reserves who were going off earlier in the game, as the Wizards rattled off a 25-10 run to pull out the victory. 

“We all kind of looked at ourselves in the mirror, like ‘OK, we’ve got to be better, we’ve got to get stops,’” Beal said. “That’s a big sign of growth for us. In timeouts and on the floor, we’re able to just adjust on the fly and be better than what we were.”