West Has Been Brooked

Westbrook's poor decision making was a
reflection on how young this Thunder
team really is.

The Dallas Mavericks are set to make to their second NBA Finals appearance in franchise history, leaving the young Oklahoma City Thunder wondering what went wrong. Oklahoma City made huge strides this season finishing fourth in the Western Conference after finishing eighth a year ago. Along with moving up in the standing they made a deep playoff run advancing to the Western Conference Finals for the fourth time in franchise history, their first in Oklahoma.

    Led by one of the most dynamic duos in the NBA with back-to-back NBA scoring champion Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook this will not be the last time the Thunder will have a chance to be in the NBA Finals.

    Durant had a great postseason, doing all he could averaging 28.6 points per game this postseason. That was almost a full point better than his season average at 27.7 points a game. In Game 1 Dallas superstar Dirk Nowitzki stole the show with 48 points in a Maverick victory, but Durant did his best to match the German point for point scoring 40 points in 42 minutes.

   That was Durant's third 40 point game of the postseason and just missing his fourth in Game 7 of the Western Conference Semi-Finals against the Memphis Grizzles with 39.

    However, Westbrook was the topic of conversation for Oklahoma City during their recent playoff push. The former UCLA Bruin was heavily criticized throughout the postseason for his poor decision making and shot selection.

    In the 17 games played by the Thunder this postseason Westbrook led the team in shots attempted eight of those games. Durant also led the team eight different times leaving one game left, and in that game both Westbrook and Durant both attempted twenty-two shots apiece. The final tally was Durant attempted 345 shots during the playoffs on forty-five percent shooting. Westbrook was not far behind with 343 shot attempts of his own, but only shot thirty-nine percent from the field.

    Westbrook averaged 23.8 points in the postseason, but had a lot more high percentage looks than Durant with his ability to get into the painted area and put up easy lay-ups. Even though Westbrook is an All-Star, you have to question the how amount of shots taken with the two-time defending scoring champion along side him.

The tandem of Durant & Westbrook
has OKC in a great spot for
years to come.

His poor decision making reflects in the numbers as Westbrook turned the ball over 78 times in the 17 games he played this postseason, that is an average of 4.6 turnovers a game. Westbrook also set an NBA record that he is surely not proud of having fourteen consecutive games with three turnovers or more.

In the five games against the Mavericks, the twenty-two-year old point guard only had two games where he had more assists than turnovers.

    It was not all bad for Westbrook as he played his best in the most crucial game of the postseason up to that point. In Game 7 of the second-round Westbrook recorded only the fifth triple-double in a Game 7 during the postseason. With his 14 points, 10 rebounds, and 14 assists, Westbrook joined Jerry West, Larry Bird, James Worthy, and Scottie Pippen as the only other players to do so in a decisive seventh game.

    On the side, thirty-eight-year old point guard Jason Kidd will become the oldest player to start in the NBA Finals, a record previously held by the Los Angeles Lakers Ron Harper back in 2000 at age 36. As this will probably be Kidd's final shot at a chance to be crowned the NBA's best, Westbrook has many years to come, according to him them will be in OKC.

    "I definitely want to play here. I love being here. I definitely would love staying here," Westbrook stated in his exit interview on Thursday.

    Despite what anyone says, the third-year guard is one of the brightest young stars in the NBA today and will eventually have his moment in the sun.