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OKLAHOMA CITY — The streak is over. The series may only be beginning.

Kevin Durant scored 22 points, Thabo Sefolosha set playoff career bests with 19 points and six steals, and the Oklahoma City Thunder snapped San Antonio's 20-game winning streak by beating the Spurs 102-82 in Game 3 of the Western Conference finals on Thursday night.

Oklahoma City closed its series deficit to 2-1 and will host Game 4 on Saturday night.

"We never thought these guys had an advantage over us even though we had lost a few," Durant said. "It was just good that we took it to 2-1. We didn't want to go down 0-3."

Sefolosha threw a wrench in the Spurs' well-oiled offense at the start, getting four steals in the first 3 minutes. The Spurs ended up committing a postseason-worst 21 turnovers and scoring their least points all season.

San Antonio had been averaging 109.4 points during its month-and-a-half winning streak and had been held to double digits only twice.

"We just played a good basketball game," Thunder coach Scott Brooks said. "We played with a lot of force, we played with good energy, but we played defensive-minded basketball. That's who we are. That's how we win."

Tony Parker and Stephen Jackson led the Spurs with 16 points apiece. Tim Duncan had 11 points on 5-for-15 shooting, taking 11 of San Antonio's first 25 shots as the offense went through the All-Star center instead of Parker.

Duncan did have five blocks to surpass Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's NBA playoff record of 476 by one.

"They played like it was a closeout game, both offensively and defensively," Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. "They were very active, physical, they moved the ball well on offense. They did all those things better than we did. They beat us good."

The Spurs, who already set an NBA record for the longest winning streak carried over from the regular season into the playoffs, were trying to match the league mark for most wins to start the postseason. The Lakers won 11 straight to start the 1989 and 2001 playoffs, getting swept in the NBA Finals the first time and winning it all the second.

The Spurs hadn't lost since April 11 at home against the Lakers.

"We are a prideful team. It's no fun being down 0-2. It's no fun," Brooks said. "But we weren't looking at the game thinking, 'Oh my gosh, we have a chance to be down 0-3.' We were looking at the game that we have a chance to be 1-2 after this game, and I give our guys a lot of credit. They believe in each other and they always play hard for each other."

Parker and Duncan didn't play in the final 15 minutes, and Popovich pulled the plug after a series of three straight turnovers allowed the deficit to reach 23 points early in the fourth quarter.

"You're not going to beat this team by playing one-effort basketball," Brooks said. "You're going to have to have two, three, four, even five. And they make you do that because they pass the ball so well, they spread the floor so well."

Popovich said the Thunder played harder and smarter than the Spurs.

"They did definitely play with a lot more energy, a lot more passion than us tonight," said Parker, who committed five turnovers.

Note

• Hall of Famer Jack Twyman, one of the NBA's top scorers in the 1950s who became the guardian to a paralyzed teammate, has died. He was 78. Twyman died Wednesday at a Cincinnati hospice of complications from an aggressive form of blood cancer, his son, Jay Twyman said. "He died peacefully with family members at his side," said Twyman.

Jack Twyman played for Cincinnati and spent 11 seasons in the NBA with the Rochester and Cincinnati Royals. In 1958, after teammate Maurice Stokes was left paralyzed after a head injury suffered during a game, Twyman became his guardian to help Stokes receive medical benefits.