CHARLOTTE, N.C. – It would be easy for Bobcats coach Mike Dunlap to tear up the blueprint amid a 16-game losing streak and come up with an entirely new plan.
But Charlotte's first-year coach has no designs for any such radical paper shredding.
Instead he's preaching patience.
When Dunlap looks at his team's struggles since opening the season 7-5 he recalls the growing pains Kevin Durant, Michael Westbrook and the rest of the Oklahoma City Thunder endured a few years ago.
Dunlap says "Durant and Westbrook took a pounding in those first two years," but the Thunder stayed the course and last year won the Western Conference championship.
So Dunlap will stick with playing youngsters like Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, Kemba Walker, Byron Mullens and Jeffery Taylor. They'll make mistakes. They'll learn on the job.