The Warriors just swept the Birds/Brow/Bourbon Street. In game 4 Steph dropped 39. Draymond (once again) demonstrated he’s a max salary player. Bogut shut down the lane. Ho Hum. Now, let’s return to the night this series actually ended: Thursday in the Smoothie King Center.
-== 7 Reasons Why Stephen Curry is the NBA MVP ==-
Quick Aside…what provides less credibility to a franchise…your arena being named “Smoothie King”, your mascot being a Pelican, or your playoff t-shirt slogan being “Play on NOLA”? Okay, back to game 3.
Game 3 was the basketball version of the series finale of Lost. The moment it ended I knew I had to watch it again. Partly for enjoyment, but mostly because what the heck just happened?! During the game I uttered, thought, and shouted phrases like…
- Utterance: “Is Ryan Anderson the best player on the court. No that’s absurd. But seriously, can anyone guard that guy?”
- Thought: “Did Ryan Anderson just talk smack to the Draymond Green? He must not know.”
- Shout: “That shot was crazier than Baron over AK47!”
Anytime an event enters the realm of Warriors greatness known only by Baron dunking over Kirilenko, you know the story needs revisiting. So that’s what I’m going to do here: relive the greatest six minute stretch I’ve ever witnessed as a Warriors fan. In full disclosure I didn’t come up with the format of this piece (Bill Simmons used it in an attempt to comprehend this year’s Super Bowl), but I’ve been saving it for an all-time crazy Warriors win and game 3 surely constituted as such!
A quick recap: The Splash Brothers hit 5 threes in the first 5 minutes of the game; the Pelicans went on a 19-0 run to end the 1st quarter and begin the 2nd; the Pelicans’ crowd was impressively riotous, albeit slow to return to their seats in the 2nd half; Ryan Anderson and Norris Cole ran the 2nd quarter like Dirk and Jason Terry ran the 2011 Finals; the Warriors were down 11 at halftime; Quincey Pondexter got T’ed up (meaningless unless the Warriors could somehow mount a comeback); the Smoothie King Center confirmed my theory that they simply use the music track from Saints games and play it at Pelicans games; the Pelicans went on a 10-2 run to end the 3rd quarter; the Warriors began the 4th quarter down 20; Ryan Anderson performed a reprisal of his Dirk act in the beginning of the 4th quarter; and every Warriors fan momentarily thought Kerr should rest the starters for Game 4 until remembering our team has the Human Torch, and their team has Monty Williams as coach. Okay, to a diary of those final 6 minutes…
6:01 (down 17):
The current state of the union: the Warriors will need to go +17 in the final 6 minutes to force overtime. In other words, they’ll have to beat the Pelicans by 2.8 points per minute just to tie it. To contextualize this, during the regular season the Warriors’ best quarter was the 2nd quarter in which they were +3.8 in point differential. So, for every minute over the next 6 minutes, the Warriors must beat the Pelicans by 1 point less than they beat teams during their best quarter during the regular season! Crazy, I know. To the game…
-Curry hits a 19 footer. Curry then makes 2 free throws after being fouled on a fast break emanating from a horrid Tyreke Evans layup attempt. The Brow checks in. A missed Curry three results in a Norris Cole dunk.
On one downside the Warriors just conceded a dunk to Norris Cole -it was his 4th of the whole year. On another downside the Warriors just made up 2 points on the Pelicans in 1 minute, which is still below the pace they need to be at. A rough start to the comeback.
5:10 (down 15):
-Livingston’s floater cuts the lead to 13. Draymond forces a Pelicans turnover, beginning a Warriors
fast break that results in him making 1 of 2 free throws. Lead cut to 12. Klay Thompson blocks a Ryan Anderson layup, and gets fouled at the other end where he subsequently makes both free throws.
It must not be forgotten that Livingston kept the Warriors in this game, scoring 8 points during the “is this game over yet?” stretch from 9:27 to 4:53. In unrelated news, during this stretch TNT color-commenter Steve Smith attempted to comment on the Defensive Player of the Award being given to Kawhi Leonard over Draymond, but immediately deducted himself of all credibility when he named DeAndre “my team’s defense gets better when I’m off the court” Jordan as a player who should have been top 2 in DPOY voting. Some things never change.
3:56 (down 10)
The camera cuts to Monty Williams who is quietly assuring himself of his own job security.
-Draymond snuffs a Davis drive. Curry’s missed three results in a put-back jam by Barnes. TNT’s Brian Anderson declares “Golden State is back”, and in accordance with the karma gods Anthony Davis answers with a dunk befitting of a man with a 7’5.5” wingspan.
For all you sports movie enthusiasts, Curry’s missed three emanated from a play I consider the Warriors’ version of the “flying V” from the classic hockey movie “The Mighty Ducks”: Draymond leads the break with Klay spotting up on his right, Curry on his left, and Barnes trailing -it’s beautiful. Interestingly, the Warriors didn’t hit a three from 6:01 to (spoiler!) 00:11.8. Instead, their comeback run was driven by hustle plays like put-backs. In the final 7 minutes, the Warriors had 5 put-backs (1 by Livingston, 2 by Draymond, and 2 by Barnes). While re-watching the game what became clear was Curry’s mere presence aided the Warriors’ rebounding effort. Most times Curry came off a screen, Anthony Davis would chase him and consequently eliminate his rebounding abilities. As Ethan Strauss first reported, with Curry off the court the Pelicans rebounded at a strong 59.4%, but with Curry on the court that number dropped to 45.5%. It’s those unseen things that can decide playoff games.
3:12 (down 10)
-Klay nails what’s becoming his signature mid-range move: an up-fake leading into a spin backwards and a fadeaway jumper. Davis gets called for offensive basket interference (see wingspan description above). Draymond puts-back a Curry miss.
The Warriors are now on a 16-4 run.
2:15 (down 6)
-A Pelicans possession featuring one dribble within the three-point results in a missed Holiday three. Draymond puts-back another Curry miss, and “The Blender” (the nickname for the Smoothie King Center) is officially on high alert.
This shackling Warriors defense is all happening with Barnes on the court (he was guarding Pondexter), which is highly encouraging. Also, if you’re curious who the culprits were who didn’t box out Draymond the past 2 possessions, it was Davis and Gordon.
1:40 (down 4)
-Tyreke Evans misses a highly contested finger-roll. Klay misses a relatively wide open three, and the Pelicans respond with a missed three of their own by Eric Gordon. Curry embarks on a 1 vs. 3 fast break until Kerr calls a timeout.
The sequence that led to Gordon’s missed three-pointer is one I find incredibly interesting. The play was supposed to be a pick-and-roll between Holiday (who eventually passed to Gordon) and Davis, but Holiday waved off Davis’ screen. In other words, at the most important juncture of the game Holiday told a top 5 player in the world to clear out of the way.
AD gives a cursory, left-arm-only “boxout” on Mo. With his height and length, Davis has probably gotten away with lacking rebounding fundamentals his entire life and doesn’t put a body on Mo, who just runs right past him. Pretty weak for a top-5 player on the biggest play of his young career. (and GREAT hands by Mo)
When Curry’s first shot went up, Pondexter was ball-watching and completely lost contact with Curry. When Mo got the rebound, Pondexter amazingly hesitated for a second and then turned to cover Curry, but Curry had already run to the corner and is no longer standing there. Pondexter must have dirtied his diaper when he realized he had no idea where Curry was.
I did get some enjoyment out of seeing the crowd celebrating and ready to party when this comeback began, having no idea that their beloved team was about to have a collapse of historic proportions. Does that make me a bad person?