	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

OKLAHOMA CITY THUNDER MEDIA CONFERENCE

June 1, 2016

Nick Collison

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

Q. Do you expect to be back next season?
NICK COLLISON: Mm-hmm.

Q. Continuing on with your career?
NICK COLLISON: Yeah, I got another year in my contract, and really enjoyed this year, and looking forward to coming back.

Q. A little different for you this year, though, you played -- didn't play much in the postseason. Was that tough on you or did you kind of fall into that role?
NICK COLLISON: I was prepared for it. Last year I didn't -- my minutes started to go down, and just looking at the roster, understanding the guys we have and the lineups, how the league is going smaller and smaller, that has probably more to do with it than anything. I understood that that was coming.

Being older, I'm not the same player I was, but I don't think -- I think it has more to do with our roster and the way the game has changed and teams playing small and things like that. I understood it and was happy with -- I really had a good time this year and really -- it's a different role, but like I said, I was ready for it and enjoyed it, and trying to help other guys and be ready when -- the biggest challenge is just being ready to play when you're not playing, having some confidence when you get in there. You haven't taken a shot in a long time, those type of things. That was an adjustment. But I did well with it.

Q. Will you be nervous at all over the next 40 or so days, Kevin's free agency enters and maybe he takes visits, those kind of things?
NICK COLLISON: Well, Kevin is so important to this place, obviously, and to our team, and a close friend of mine. I really enjoy my time with him. So for sure it's a big deal. For us we need him back. We'll try to communicate how important he is to us and how much he means to us. You know, we understand what this is and how it works, and it'll be to him at the end of the day. But he means everything to us in terms of a friend, a teammate, and what he's done for the organization and for the future what we're trying to do, obviously we need him, so it's a big deal for us.

Q. How will you kind of navigate that, being his friend but also wanting to give him space?
NICK COLLISON: Yeah, I don't know. Just communicate to him what he means to me and to us. There's no real selling. I think there's nothing he doesn't know about this place and what we're about, and I think it's just letting him know how important he is to us and being there if he wants to talk, I guess, then realizing that he's going to make his own decision and that's it.

Q. You've been in the league a little while now; do you use the off-season at this point? Do you sit back and kind of think about what you're going to do after basketball, whether it's coaching or anything else?
NICK COLLISON: I've thought a lot about it. As you get older, you know that that day is coming. I'll consider a lot of things. I think I also realize that things change, and I've got another year to play, so I can't make any decisions now. But considering my options, I guess. A lot of it has to do with my personal life. I have a 10-year-old daughter and that will be my priority. It is now, but even more so is getting as much time with her I can after missing some time playing. That will be a big issue for me is -- not issue, but that will be a main priority for me is what's best for her, so that'll be a big part of my decision.

Q. Has there been a sense of pride for you this year just seeing how the big men have progressed, particularly Steven Adams?
NICK COLLISON: It's been great, and those guys have put in a lot of work and deserve all the credit. But I think for the rest of us who have been here and tried to help, it does, it makes us feel good, too. Steven in particular I think I always -- from the day he got here, I knew he had the ability to be a really special player, and I think what we're seeing with him is a confidence that he's getting and being comfortable with the NBA game, recognizing things in the NBA game -- recognizing things on the floor before they happen and being able to fully react and use his ability now that he's got some experience. I know it was really fun to see how well he played. Enes played great. Serge continues to get better. It's been fun to see our young guys develop and really step up in the Playoffs.

Q. How good do you think Steven can become? What's that guy going to look like at 25, 26 years old?
NICK COLLISON: He's as good as anybody in the league at that position. I mean, when you look at the things he can do, he can -- I think he can be a post-up player. He doesn't get a ton of opportunity now, but he's got the tools to do it. He can be a roller to the rim and catch lobs and be a real threat at the rim, which is so valuable today with the way teams want to spread the floor. He can guard post-ups as well as anybody. You don't have to take him out, as we saw, when teams play small, he can switch on guys. He's a really unique player. He can do so many things at the center position, and then all of that -- going forward, I think his mindset, how hard he works and those things is really what make him special. He works incredibly hard. He wants to learn. He's a great teammate. He wants to perform for his team. I think the sky's the limit for him, and it's going to be fun to watch.

Q. What stood out to you or just general thoughts about kind of the team's ascension throughout the last two, three months of the season? You guys as a team seemed like you were playing your best basketball at the right time of the year.
NICK COLLISON: We talked at the beginning of the year that it was going to be an adjustment, and there was times where it looked ugly. We had a new coach, new staff, new players, and we knew it wasn't going to be pretty the whole time, and I think that's exactly what happened. We had stretches where we didn't play as well. Some of that, our focus wasn't as good as it needed to be at times. But by the end of the year we wanted to be playing our best basketball, and we continued to get better as the Playoffs went on, and we were playing at a very high level at the end.

Q. You guys play at an incredibly high rate, high level the last month. What do you need to do better in terms of what this roster needs or what the guys on the roster need to do better? What's the next step in terms of particular play?
NICK COLLISON: Well, I think, like you said, we played at a very high level, the highest level, and we're very close. You're playing against some of the -- San Antonio, Golden State, some of the best teams the league has ever seen, and we were right there.

I think for us, the longer we can have those stretches of high focus like we had in those playoff games, the more that that is closer to our norm, the better on the defensive end. I think we're capable of being a much better defensive team than we were during the regular season. There's no question about that. And sustaining that for longer periods.

And then on the offensive end, continuing to execute and get better shots at the toughest times. That's the hardest part, I think, in these playoff series is generating good shots against the best defenses at the most difficult times. All the work that goes into that throughout the season so that we're as prepared as possible at the end.

Q. 10, 20 years from now, will you look back at maybe Game 6 or this series as kind of like -- will it still sting do you think?
NICK COLLISON: Well, a lot of them sting. I'm now almost 10, 20 years from college and it stung every year we lost in college in the NCAA Tournament. You always have that, I think. I think for sure, I mean, we were very close, and whenever you're that close to getting to The Finals and potentially having a shot at a championship, it will always sting, but it's also really cool, too, and there's a lot of -- there will be a lot of moments I'll remember of winning on the road, against San Antonio twice, and how well we played. This was a really fun run for all of us, and I think we were as -- this is the best we've ever played and the closest we've ever been as a team, this playoff run, and it was a lot of fun to be a part of, so there was a lot of positives, too. That's the way I'll always look at it.

Q. You talked about kind of where the league is going, that everybody is doing the small ball thing. Your team, this franchise, seems to buck the trend. It seems like that's something the team wants to develop. Do you like the fact that you guys kind of stand out in that regard?
NICK COLLISON: Well, yeah, I think we have a unique ability to have guys that you don't have to take out of the game when teams go small, and that's the difference that a lot of teams don't have. We can keep Serge in the game and he can switch on guards, and same thing with Steven. Enes actually did surprise a lot of people by being able to guard Iguodala, Barnes, and hold his own, and still be a threat on the offensive end where they have to deal with him on the boards. A lot of it has to do with the ability of our guys, but I think Coach Donovan was trying to find things that worked in our advantage, and we found a lot of things, and with the roster it gives us the ability to play in different ways, and I think he did a really good job of using the different lineups, being able to play small and big and get advantages from each way.

Q. Even as an older player or a player who's been in the league longer, were you even apprehensive about some of the things that Donovan was bringing in?
NICK COLLISON: I wasn't apprehensive. I think it was just an adjustment. When you have one guy for so long, we had Scottie for however many years, and someone wants to do new things, it's different. I think the players did a good job of keeping an open mind, and we talked about that even in a couple meetings that we had before the season, without coach being in those meetings, about how it doesn't do us any good to waste time fighting what the new guys wants to do. There could be a situation where you say, well, it worked the old way, why are we doing it this way, but I think we did a good job of having an open mind. I think Russell and Kevin and Serge and those guys that have had a ton of success deserve a lot of credit for that, for having an open mind, and then Coach Donovan, as well. He was willing to learn and change and listen to input from players, and I thought -- just I think it went really well, and it could have been a tougher situation. I think the staff and the players did a good job of making it work.

Q. What was maybe the most frustrating point of this transition process at some point during the season, and where do you feel like it clicked?
NICK COLLISON: Well, there were frustrating times in the season for sure where we knew we weren't playing very well, and we should be playing better. Again, a lot of that was focus on our part. There were some things that Coach would probably say that he got better at and understood better, and with the NBA game and our team, understood his players better, the things that we were doing at the end that helped us. But I thought we had that really bad stretch after the All-Star break and then once we snapped out of that we started playing some better basketball. We still would have frustrating losses all the way to the end of the season that we felt like we shouldn't be having. So there wasn't necessarily one time. The stretch after the All-Star break was probably where we had our most frustrating times by not playing as well as we knew we were capable of.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297