SAN ANTONIO -- Oklahoma City Thunder point guard Russell Westbrook stripped the ice packs from his knees, then rose from his seat in the cramped visitors locker room at San Antonio’s AT&T Center.

“I got my powers back,” Westbrook said, then repeated it again a bit louder. “I got my powers back.”

Said powers were applied with force and precision in the Thunder’s

114-106 win over the San Antonio Spurs on Thursday, with a gaudy box-score line for Westbrook: 34 points (14-for-28 from the field), 11 assists, 4 rebounds and 5 steals.

You can find a larger context for this performance by reviewing The Week In Russ. After Kevin Durant went down with an ankle sprain in a loss at Golden State, the Thunder squeaked by the Lakers the following night on a high-volume, low-efficiency effort from Westbrook. But it wasn’t until the Thunder dropped consecutive home games to New Orleans and Portland that the rumblings about Westbrook’s shot selection materialized.

Westbrook was a loose cannon down the stretch against the Pelicans on Sunday, 0-for-6 from the field without delivering a single pass in the final four minutes as the Thunder squandered a six-point lead. After the game, Westbrook was unapologetic, telling the media, “My job is to stay in attack mode and try to score and try to make plays happen. If I miss, then I miss. I'm going to live and die by that every night, regardless of what happens.”

On Monday, he conceded that he’d been too eager from beyond the arc, but also bristled at the idea that probabilities, however ugly, should govern his thinking: “And I think it's very important people understand the game, not just the stats. You have to honestly understand the game, understand what's going on throughout the game.”

Chatter about Westbrook’s hero-ball tendencies were compounded on Tuesday when the Thunder coughed up a 10-point lead inside of two minutes, with Westbrook getting hit with a technical, then breaking off from the offensive set on the final possession of regulation.

An hour before Thursday’s tip, Durant quelled the tide against Westbrook, dismissing criticism of Westbrook and offering up a hearty "Let Russ be Russ" message.

“Who cares what people say? [He should] just play his game. From watching the last two games, he’s the reason why we had a chance to win -- his aggressiveness, getting his teammates involved."

Westbrook isn’t one of those players who pontificates publicly about personal shortcomings, and rarely will you witness a “my bad” either on the court or postgame at his locker. When challenged about his judgment, he’s fond of responding with his job description, which is to attack -- he used that phrasing after the New Orleans loss and again after the big Christmas win at San Antonio.

“I’ve said it before and I’m going to keep saying it, my job is to continue to attack,” Westbrook said after Thursday’s victory.

In Westbrook’s eyes, if you have qualms about his style, then your issue isn’t with him or his behavior so much as it is with the deliverables of the job as Thunder point guard. The fact that he’s 10-for-29 from the field inside of five minutes in games within a five-point margin isn’t a reflection of personal failure, but the demands of that job.

“Miss or makes, I don’t really pay no attention to it, to tell you the truth,” Westbrook said. “I just keep going and try to find the best way for us to get a chance to win the game.”

Westbrook’s process yielded his intended result against the Spurs’ uncharacteristically lackluster defense on Thursday. He marshaled an offense that looked not unlike what San Antonio generally executes.

During a particularly graceful stretch of four consecutive possessions in the third quarter, Westbrook was at his best. First, a pick-and-pop with Serge Ibaka in which Westbrook delivered the pass to his open teammate the instant both defenders came at him. Next, deep penetration off the dribble, then a jump pass to Andre Roberson in the right corner for an open 3-pointer. Forty-five seconds later, he finds Ibaka alone behind the arc off a pick-and-roll with Roberson. Finally, he gets his -- quintessential Russ with a nasty drive to the hoop, splitting defenders on the wing, then contorting around Tiago Splitter at the rim.

The takeaway here isn’t that Westbrook is a transcendent and versatile talent -- we knew that. It’s that attacking and distributing aren’t mutually exclusive. Westbrook stayed as true to his job description on Thursday as he ever has, and he also led a collective shredding of the Spurs' defense that left Gregg Popovich irate after the game.

“I don’t think the score was indicative of how badly we were beaten,”

Popovich said. “They were more physical, more focused, they wanted the basketball game, and I think we floated around as if we’re entitled.”

Westbrook has the power to demoralize, and from where he’s standing at the top of the court, that can’t be done with temperance. And it was in this spirit that when asked if game management and shot selection and judgment were really just shibboleths people brandished after a loss but never a win, he returned the question with a wide, mischievous grin that suggested without a word: “You said it, not me.”