Up by 7 with less than 2 minutes left on the road in game 1 of a playoff series against the most athletic team in the NBA sounds like a steal for the oldest team in the league, but no. On a last second shot by Kevin Durant, NBA scoring champion for a third straight year, the Thunder get the win. The shot was well contested by Shawn Marion, but got a lucky bounce. Dirk Nowitzki turned the ball over in the last minute to give the Thunder a break-away slam to give them a 1 point lead before Dirk hit two clutch free throws. In short, a lot of different story lines to the game and it's outcome, but head coach Rick Carlisle wants all the blame. During the post game press conference, Carlisle did not shy away from the criticism and even put more on himself. "We should have double teamed [Durant] and got the ball out his hands...blame me", he stated. He is probably right, but hard to argue the defense Shawn Marion played on Durant making the shot as difficult as it was. More of...
