The new West? Oklahoma City Thunder usher in new era with dismantling of Spurs - MassLive.com

Oklahoma City Thunder small forward Kevin Durant (35) celebrates against the San Antonio Spurs during the second half of Game 6 in the NBA basketball Western Conference finals, Wednesday, June 6, 2012, in Oklahoma City. The Thunder won 107-99. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

OKLAHOMA CITYâ€"It’s a funny thing about these two teams that are so different from each other on the surface, one sprinting toward its first championship, the other staggering toward the end of an era of excellence.

The Thunder and Spurs are, in so many ways, exactly alike. The young champions of the Western Conference and their vanquished old foes are the kindred spirits of the NBA.

At least, Oklahoma City fans should hope that’s the case.

The nucleus of the Thunderâ€"Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, James Harden, Serge Ibakaâ€"is so young it’s truly tantalizing to think of what might be accomplished here. Durant and Westbrook are 23. Harden and Ibaka are 22. You might have noticed by now that they’re all pretty darned good at basketball.

Durant, fast emerging with a powerful challenge to the general consensus that LeBron James is the game’s best player, is in his fifth season, but he’s five years younger than Michael Jordan was when the Bulls won their first of six. He’s five years younger than Shaquille O’Neal was when the Lakers won their first of three in a row in 2000.

Take a guess how many years Shaq was in L.A. before he got a ring. The answer is four. And that was after his four years in Orlando. These championship deals take time.

But that wasn’t the case with the three stars in San Antonio. Tim Duncan won a title in his second season. Same with Tony Parker. Manu Ginobili got a ring as a 25-year-old NBA rookieâ€"the first season all three played together.

As remarkable as that early success was, what’s so much more amazing about the Spurs is their longevity. That first title for Ginobili and Parker, and the second for Duncan, came in 2003. Harden, the guy with the beard out to here, was 13 then.

Now Harden’s chasing glory and Duncan, who’s been at this NBA thing since 1997, may have taken his last sniff of glory. How simply awe-inspiring that the Spursâ€"who hadn’t won a single second-round playoff game since 2008â€"were able to finish atop the Western Conference regular-season standings, thrill us with a 20-game winning streak and even make many of us believe that June would once again belong to them.

How simply sad we can turn that page pretty much knowing we won’t get fooled like that again.

“It is very disappointing,” Duncan said in an otherwise silent locker room. “I thought this was our time to get back to the Finals and push for another championship. That was our singular goal, but obviously it ends here.”

He didn’t mean forever, but we wouldn’t blame him for thinking it.

The Spurs are an old team. After 20 straight wins, they lost four in a rowâ€"each one demoralizing in its own way. On Wednesday night, there was no mistaking why the same team that built an 18-point second-quarter lead was left grasping at air in the final minute of the fourth, unable to just reach out and foul somebody.

They were tired. Their run is done.

But their impact is still being feltâ€"more than everâ€"by a team that, if all goes as well as it could, might someday be remembered as the Spurs’ successor.

“I respect Tim Duncan and the whole organization so much,” Durant said. “They do things the right way. They play the game the right way. They’re a family.”

What Durant said next should be as enduring a lesson as any provided during this series. Durant said the Spurs are the model his team follows.

It’s a beautiful thing. Duncan is an all-time great, and anyone would agree Durant has that sort of potential. Parker is one of the quickest, most explosive point guards of the past decade, and who wouldn’t describe Westbrook the same way? Harden has essentially the same left-handed, shoot-or-drive game as Ginobili. But the comparisons only begin there.

The Spurs are a family. Where O’Neal and Kobe Bryant fractured, where James fell out of love with Cleveland, the Spurs somehow became even stronger.

And the Thunder are the same way. For now, that is. What happens after that first title comes, and then perhaps a second? What happens if Westbrook wakes up one day and decides, as Kobe did, that it’s time for him to be the man? Or if Harden decides his sixth-man days are over?

So many things can kill a locker room. The Spurs have stayed together all this time, and that’s the best thing the Thunder can hope for.

There was a nice podium moment after Game 6. A reporter asked Durant about the key charge he’d taken from Ginobili as the Thunder were roaring toward their first lead. Before Durant could speak, Westbrook piped up: “That was his first charge of the year.”

He was teasing Durant, but it was true. “I was gonna say that, Russ,” Durant deadpanned.

Can you imagine a teammate making a joke like that about a deficiency in James’ game? Probably not.