50 + D= Round 2

 

It was one for the ages--in more ways than one.

Stephan Curry scored fifty points, more than anyone else in NBA history in the 7th game of a playoff series.  That's not "more than anyone 35 or over."  Anyone. (I expect as he scored his last bucket--after he'd dribbled through the entire Kings team--he might have already known the previous record-holder was Kevin Durant with 48.)  He added 8 rebounds and had just one turnover.  It was not just a great individual performance, it was team leadership.  It meant victory and redemption.

Besides Curry's reported pre-game challenge to the Warriors and then his performance, or as part of it, there was strategy. The playoffs are often about making adjustments from game to game. When Mike Brown went small with his Sacramento Kings lineup in the sixth game and it worked, it was likely he would do it again in the seventh game.  So on Saturday Steve Kerr and the Warriors planned how to counter it, and how to run an offense against it.  The Warriors planned possessions and had plays to get points early. Early in the game Steph Curry began to see the lanes open to him due to the Kings lineup and how they were playing. "There's a reason I took 38 shots."   The Dubs took care of the ball, and with Draymond Green back in the starting lineup, they amped up their defense.  Defense leads to offense, and made shots leads to getting set on defense and forcing the Kings into the half court game.  

Then you sprinkle it all with magic dust in the form of Steph Curry and you have a gritty and finally dominant seventh game victory--the worst road team in the regular season to be in the playoffs, winning the first round with their two best games--virtual masterpieces--on the road.

 Another key was rebounding: Kevon Looney had his third game of the series with 20 or more rebounds: 21.  None of the other Warriors shot particularly well, but several of them got key baskets to keep the Kings on their heels.  Klay Thompson, who had several of those key baskets and played tough defense, said after the sixth game that all the Warriors had to do to win the 7th was to do the opposite of what they did in the 6th.  In fact the scores of the two games were almost mirror images, as the Warriors won 120-100.  The Warriors held fast in the first half, started pulling away in a dominant third quarter, and turned the fourth quarter into a rout, much as the Kings had done in game 6. 

With his flips and floaters added to his repertoire, Steph Curry looks like he's installed a magnet in the basket and he's sticking iron filings on the ball as he dribbles.  The basket swallows everything he sends its way.  It's been clear for a few years now that he's added strength to his game--he can muscle opponents out of his way to the basket, as well as making them dizzy with his dribbling and feints.  Recently he's become more consistent, in the 30 to 40 point range every game.  The lows faded along with the highs.  So maybe nobody was contemplating 50 points, but all that scoring and how he scored not only added up, it demoralized the Kings.  

As for the rest of the team, it begins to look more and more like the problems the Warriors have had this season are due to effort and concentration.  They are hard to maintain in an overlong NBA season, especially on the road.  They kept talking about playoff experience and championship DNA, of flipping the switch, but it was starting to sound like wishful thinking.  Now it doesn't.  The sixth game was a worrisome lapse, but they won four of their last five games, two at home and two on the road.  Look out, Lakers.

Despite losing three of their four regular season games against the Lakers, the Warriors have home court in the second round, because the Lakers are a play-in team.  It's a new series with a very different team.  The Lakers are bigger than the Kings, and Anthony Davis is a handful on both ends.  So can LeBron James be, though there are questions about how healthy he actually is.  The Dubs may change their rotations in response, perhaps giving more minutes to Kaminga and Moody.  First game is Tuesday evening at the Chase Center.