NBA Playoffs 2011: Thunder Collapse Points to Team's Need to Dump Scott Brooks

The 2011 NBA Playoffs Took A Tragic Twist for the Oklahoma City Thunder After Blowing A Game 4 Lead

When you're the coach of a young team anchored by two stars, you have to be a micro-manager. 

You have to impose your will on your players and get them to play your style of basketball. In big moments, your young stars will look to you for guidance to help them through unfamiliar situations.

Last night, the Oklahoma City Thunder played like their head coach—clueless and gutless.

Once James Harden fouled out of the game, the Thunder fell into the same predictable, pitiful offense that has doomed them in previous games.

Oklahoma City settled for outside jumpers and fell into the same parade of isolation plays that veteran teams can snuff out in an instant. Their predictability allowed the Dallas Mavericks to crawl back into the game.

There was no effort to get Kevin Durant on the block. The Thunder didn't run plays to the rim, and it resulted in turnovers, missed shots and desperation as Dirk Nowitzki and the Mavericks stormed back and forced overtime.

Give credit to Dallas, who clamped down on defense in crunch time, but when you see bland, mindless offense, it's not hard to cause stops. Durant is a great spot-up shooter, and there was no attempt to run him off of a screen and get him free for a shot.

You have to play to your team's strengths, and time and time again, we've learned that the isolation offense is not Oklahoma City's strong suit.

The apocalypse that was the fourth quarter culminated with Oklahoma City's final possession of regulation, where Brooks drew up a play that got Durant the ball right near the half-court line.

As the clock wound down, the young star panicked and took a horrible desperation shot that was swatted away by Shawn Marion, sending the game to the extra session and effectively dooming the Thunder.

Brooks lost control, and his young team followed him right off of the cliff as we've seen at other junctures in this postseason. The hopelessness was written all over Brooks' face, and the slumped shoulders and somber faces of this young Thunder team told the story long before the box score did.

There is no denying the job Brooks has done in helping this team grow into a Western Conference power, but it's become horrifyingly evident to anyone who has watched the Thunder in the playoffs that he is not going to be the man who gets this squad over the top.

Oklahoma City is playing way over its head right now, and from here on out, it needs a veteran voice that can guide this team through crunch time. Sometimes we forget that the Thunder are only playing in their fourth postseason series, and it could be that we're expecting too much from a team anchored by Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, both just 22 years old.

This is not a veteran team. This is a group that hasn't taken its lumps, hasn't been battle-tested, and frankly, doesn't have the scars that members of the Mavericks possess.

Nowitzki is haunted by the memories of watching a championship slip away against Miami and being eliminated by an eight-seed as he was basking in the glow of an MVP season.

Jason Kidd still remembers his two failures in the NBA Finals, and Rick Carlisle will never forget being fired from the Detroit Pistons only to watch Larry Brown guide the franchise to a championship a year later.

Those scars made this team what it is today, and the Thunder are learning the hard way what it takes to become a champion.

Sadly for Scott Brooks, he has been exposed as a late-game choker and someone who isn't savvy enough with the x's and o's to guide a team to a title. While he was the perfect man to guide this team to the big dance, he's not the coach to bring it all home.

If the Thunder want to continue to develop into a championship contender, it's time to get a veteran coach that can mold these young stars into champions.

Otherwise, collapses like Game 4 will become commonplace as Brooks continues to set his players up for failure.

Players have to play, but not even the greatest athletes can overcome poor game planning.