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NBA WESTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: THUNDER v SPURSJune 6, 2012Scott BrooksOKLAHOMA CITY, OKLAHOMA: Game Six Oklahoma City – 107 SCOTT BROOKS: Well, first, I just want to acknowledge Coach Pop and the Spurs organization. I've said this before to my staff, that one thing about Pop for all coaches, for all sports, he is a great example. He's a great mentor, and I never really spent time with him, but I've followed him and watched his moves and read everything about him and what an incredible coach. I have a lot of respect for what he does and how he does it. He represents the NBA in an amazing fashion. I'm thankful for our ownership. They give us a great opportunity. When we were 3 and 29, they still treated us as champions, and our players felt that. They felt that from day one when we came into OKC. We've always felt we were treated like champions. Sam has done an incredible job of building this team from the ground up through draft, through important trades, and he's given me players with high character, players that believe in work, players that believe in each other, and it's a great group of guys to coach. I'm thankful that I have the guys that we have. They all do their job. I thought they displayed that tonight. When we were down 18, there was a lot of opportunities, most teams would have said, OK, we've got to somehow suck it up and win Game 7 in San Antonio, but they never did that. The leadership that Russell has displayed, I'm proud of him. He gets criticized a lot, and I tell him, don't worry about what other people say; you're not their point guard, you're my point guard, and I like what he's about. I like what he represents. He had a never‑quit attitude tonight, and he did a good job of helping us win this game. Q. Can you just talk about how proud you are of the guys in the second half for sticking together and making that big run and committing to defense the whole time? SCOTT BROOKS: Well, we talked about it. We talked about it at halftime. We talked about a few things that were very important, and it had nothing to do with the stats, had nothing to do with the fact that we gave up nine threes, had nothing to do that we gave up a lot of turnovers, had nothing to do with passing the ball. It had everything to do with who we are as men, who we are as a team, the type of spirit that we want to show every time down the court, and it was all about that, about body language, about being a family. I thought our guys did that the first possession of that second half, and they did not look back. The Spurs are a terrific team. They're an unbelievable team. You don't win 20 games in a row in this league. Four teams have ever done it, and Pop is one of the best coaches in all sports, and our guys just kept plugging away and fighting back and making the game very respectable going into that fourth quarter. Q. Can you talk about Kevin Durant got all 48 minutes, can you talk about that? And also, is it a surreal experience? I know it is with a lot of fans out there. How does it feel with you? SCOTT BROOKS: Well, it is. You know, I was fortunate enough to play in this league for many years, and I also was fortunate enough to win a championship in Houston in '94. But when you're a kid you always think about winning a championship, and I was never a star player, so I never had dreams of making the last shot. I had dreams of being on a team, and now I get to coach a team that believes in each other, that continues to impress me by the way they work, by the way they care for one another, and that's what the good teams do in this league. And our guys did a great job all year. It is, it's an incredible experience to be in this position. But you have‑‑ if you want to win a championship, you have to go through a lot of good teams, and we went through some very, very incredible organizations, Lakers, Dallas, San Antonio, and then in order to win a championship, we're going to have to go through Miami or Boston. But we have to do it one game at a time. We've got four more wins to go, and the first team to four. Q. Kevin's line is full of numbers that could be the most impressive thing anybody did all night, but what stands out to you? SCOTT BROOKS: Really what stands out? That I think he took his first charge. I'm not so sure he took one his first few years, but you know that was a big play. He stepped in there and took the charge and prevented him from getting the easy basket. I mean, it's amazing. It's an amazing moment for him to play like this in this moment, in this setting. I wasn't going to take him out. I was not going to take him out, I don't care how many times he looked at me fatigued. He has enough and I think all of our guys have enough to play, you just have to fight through it. Kevin did a great job of rebounding, passing, defending, and he did take that charge. Q. Big first half for Tony Parker, 21 points, 10 assists, only eight and two assists the second half. What did you do different? SCOTT BROOKS: Well, like I said, we changed. We just changed who we‑‑ our body language, our spirit, our competitiveness just changed after the 16 minutes during time‑out. We weren't going to win the game playing the same way, and we talked about that at halftime. And we were focused on playing much better. You're going to have to beat this team by playing hard, and we did that in the first half when things were not going well because we gave up too many opportunities for them to get open jump shots. But the second half it just changes because I think Thabo did a great job on them. Thabo really got him to the basketball and made him work for his points. Q. You guys have taken the hard path dating back to four years ago. In what ways have the failures of this roster, this franchise, shaped you guys? SCOTT BROOKS: Yeah, I mean, the three wins and the 29 losses, there was a lot of, lot of, lot of work that had to go into it. Sam has done a great job of building this team, and we've done a good job as an organization. Everybody, everybody is a part of this. It's just not Sam, and it's just not myself, it's our staff, it's the medical team, it's the equipment managers, it's everybody that have to do their job. To win, even back then, we weren't losing games, I was telling the guys we were learning how to win games, and there's a big difference between that because we had guys that worked every day and it gave me hope that when we were down they were still practicing, still working hard. Kevin is an amazing young man. The stat line is not even close to who he is as a young man. He's respected by his teammates, by his staff, by the city. He's a great ambassador to this league, and I'm proud to coach him. He wants to be coached. He's just a great leader. Q. You mentioned the character of these guys and how you like going to work with these guys. I know you have another series coming up, but is it hard not to get excited about‑‑ these guys are really young, get excited about what should be a pretty great future? SCOTT BROOKS: Well, I tell these guys, it's all about doing your job every day. I know I'm the‑‑ I don't ever tell them I coach them. It's always a partnership. It's always I lead them, and they do a good job of allowing me to do that, and I coach them hard. I don't give them the benefit of the doubt because they're only 22 years old and 23 years old; they've got a job to do. We all have a job to do, and you have to do it every day. Just because you're young doesn't mean that you can't play hard, you can't practice hard, you can't have a great attitude for your teammates, and our guys have done that. But it's a group effort. We have great leadership within our team, and I think our staff does a good job of working and building each guy and developing each guy because that's what we do. We love to develop players. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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