Western Conference Finals Preview: Mavericks and Thunder

It has taken a while but we are finally here, the Western Conference Finals. If you can remember it took Dallas only four games to send the Lakers on summer vacation and Oklahoma City punched their ticket today after winning Game 7 against the blue collar Memphis Grizzlies.

Again we have a young versus old match up, however this OKC team isn’t an inexperienced young side and Dallas is standing the test of time. Let’s break down this series and see how it will unfold.

Dallas has Nowitzki and OKC has Durant, both unstoppable and neither team has anyone who can match up against them. The only person that is going to beat them is themselves and that is very unlikely. Each team’s supporting cast is very good, the Thunder has more presence inside with Perkins and Ibaka, but I don’t expect them to dominate the boards like the Bulls did against Miami. The Mavs have a better scoring punch coming from their supporting cast with Terry, Kidd, Barea and Stojakovic all able to light it up in a short amount of time.

This series will be in the hands of Russell Westbrook, like I said in OKC’s Game 7 preview, he will have to play more like a point guard rather than a scorer. He did that in Game 7 and the Thunder came away with a comfortable win in the end. No Dallas player is going to be able to match up with Westbrook, in Oklahoma City’s case let’s hope that this doesn’t go to his head and make him think that he can take everyone on because that’s what he’ll be doing when the four Dallas players come to help on defense.

It is going to be interesting to see if Westbrook has learned anything from the last to series. OKC’s trip to the NBA Finals lies with him, but I don’t think he is at that level where he can be consistent for four games, especially against the tough veteran Mavericks.

Dallas wins the series in 5

Until next time..

D.B.

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Update: Andrew Bogut to play in Croatia

Congratulations to the Croatian media, you had your 15 minutes of fun! Shortly after news broke about Bogut going to Cibona if there is a lockout he wrote the following on twitter:

At least we know that Europe isn’t out of the question for Bogut if there is a lockout, lets hope he can get that elbow right for whenever that next season is going to be.

Andrew Bogut to play in Croatia

More rumors are arising about NBA players going to play in Europe if a lockout comes into effect. Reported by the Croatian website Vecernji.hr the general manager of Croatian basketball club Cibona announced that Andrew Bogut will play for them if there is a lockout. The report states that Bogut will essentially play for free, only asking the club to pay for his insurance. It also mentioned that he will not be the only NBA player to make the move to Cibona, saying that they expect one or two players to add to their roster.

 

Obviously once the lockout is lifted Bogut and his fellow players will be able to return to the NBA and resume the season with their respective clubs. Vecernji.hr raised solid arguments defending player’s decisions to come to Europe during the lockout, players will be playing at a high level and a competitive league, they will be staying in shape while waiting for the lockout to be lifted and citing the previous lockout where Vlade Divac went to play for his former club Crvena Zvezda (Red Star) in Serbia for two games before returning to the NBA.

HoopsWeblog.com will dedicate a page to NBA players wanting to play in Europe during the lockout. Follow HoopsWeblog.com on twitter or subscribe to see who else will be making travel plans for next season.