Fred Hoiberg rips into team, lets players know that they ‘folded’

The Thunder had a rough landing in Chicago late Friday night.

Their team charter hit an object — likely a bird — that dented the front of the plane on its descent and obviously put a scare into the entire traveling party.

“[Expletive], thankful, man,’’ Thunder All-Star guard Russell Westbrook said. “You don’t ever take anything for granted. I just feel thankful and blessed that they were able to land the plane and everything was OK.’’

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Once on the ground, Westbrook and Co. had nothing to fear from the Bulls.

Thanks to Westbrook’s triple-double (12 points, 13 rebounds, 13 assists), the Thunder (3-3) overwhelmed the home team, manhandling the Bulls from start to finish in a 101-69 laugher.

But coach Fred Hoiberg didn’t find much humor in the rout and delivered the angriest postgame news conference of his Bulls tenure.

“We took a huge step in the wrong direction,’’ Hoiberg said. “We didn’t compete, we didn’t stay together and we didn’t fight through adversity as a team. We were careless, stagnant. They got the loose balls. That can’t happen. That cannot happen with this group.

“It’s very disappointing coming off the encouraging win against Atlanta by doing all the little things. We had none of that. And our body language sucked. Things weren’t going well, and we dropped our heads and just kind of gave in. You can’t do that as a young team.’’

It wasn’t exactly the debut second-year point guard Kris Dunn was hoping for. Dunn finally played in a regular-season game with his new team after dealing with a dislocated left index finger since mid-preseason.

Coming off the bench, he overcame an 0-for-3 start to finish 4-for-9

with eight points, four rebounds, three assists and three steals.

Starting point guard Jerian Grant was awful, going 0-for-7 from the field and missing a wide-open Lauri Markkanen on several occasions.

Markkanen made his first two three-pointers, then his teammates seemingly forgot he was out there.

He still had a team-high 15 points but seemed headed for a big night before being overlooked.

“We’ll determine that in practice,’’ Hoiberg said when asked if Grant could lose his starting job to Dunn. “It’s open right now. We’re going to go in and compete and see who wants to play.’’

That’s good news for Dunn, who has been saying the right things about eventually wanting that starting job but also remaining respectful of Grant.

“I love to compete,’’ Dunn said. ‘‘Like I said before, I’m not trying to go for the starting spot, you know, but it’s definitely a dream of mine to start for my organization, so I’m going to compete.’’

Someone had better be ready to compete by the time the Bulls get to Miami for the game Wednesday against the Heat. Hoiberg made that exceedingly clear.

“I did let them have it at halftime, and we came out right away [in the third], cut the lead to 14, then folded again,’’ Hoiberg said. “That can’t happen.’’

Follow me on Twitter @suntimes_hoops.

Email: jcowley@suntimes.com