After beating the San Antonio Spurs four games in a row and heading on to the NBA Finals, the Oklahoma City Thunder made themselves the team to beat in the Western Conference. With their youth and talent, it looked like this year was going to be a sign of things to come for a long time.
Now that the L.A. Lakers have formed their super team, some people, myself included, are already passing the Western Conference torch back to them, cutting the Thunder “dynasty” down to a one year success story.
Some writers from Daily Thunder agree with me that the Lakers are now the biggest roadblock to Oklahoma City returning to the Finals, but they’re also not ready to look past the Spurs.
The three guys all put the Spurs second on their list of teams to watch out for, saying that no matter how old they get, you never count them out of the race.
“They’re the Terminator of professional sports,” said Royce Young. “They don’t die. Until Tim Duncan is crushed and melted, I won’t ever say the Spurs are done. Especially considering Tony Parker has quietly become one of the NBA’s undisputed top 10 players. They’re a year older than last season which means they’re OLD, but we should’ve all learned our lesson with the Spurs four years ago. You don’t write them off.”
I still say this is a two horse race between the Lakers and Thunder next season, but I’m always one of the idiots who counts out the Spurs as being too old when they’re clearly not.
In all honesty, I hope the Spurs come to play next season. I would love to see a three-team battle for Western Conference supremacy. Hypothetically, let’s say the Lakers grab the one seed, the Thunder get the two and the Spurs get the three. The conference playoffs would be epic. Watching the Thunder and Spurs clash, with the winner getting to take on the Lakers, and the winner of that series going to take on the Miami Heat for the title. That would be such an amazing playoffs.
I know, I really got ahead of myself there. There’s too many variables and too many things that can change before next year’s playoffs to be speculating that much.
I do think the Spurs can still compete with the Lakers and Thunder, but they’ll have to play their best basketball. Matching up with the size and talent of those two teams is going to be a huge mountain to climb. The Spurs will surely bring their best and hope to avenge this season’s loss to the Thunder to prove they still belong in the conversation of Western Conference elite.
