Heated Draymond Green, OJ Mayo face off after Warriors beat Bucks
The Golden State Warriors made sure everybody knew that they didn’t appreciate the way the Milwaukee Bucks celebrated knocking off the Warriors last Saturday and snapping the defending champs’ historic 24-game season-opening winning streak. They made sure everybody knew they’d be seeking vengeance when the Bucks visited Oracle Arena on Friday night. And for three-plus quarters, the Bucks made sure everybody knew that they didn’t really give a damn how the big bad Warriors felt.
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Jason Kidd’s young Bucks physically imposed their will on the Dubs in their own gym, riding an out-of-his-mind performance from point guard Michael Carter-Williams (whose woofing following a final-minute dunk last week raised the Warriors’ ire), strong all-around outings from Greg Monroe and Giannis Antetokounmpo, and timely contributions from reserves O.J. Mayo and Miles Plumlee to lead by as many as 15 points and hold an 11-point advantage with eight minutes left in the fourth quarter.
And then, as they’ve done so many times over the past year, the Warriors got loose.
Golden State outscored Milwaukee 32-12 over the final eight minutes of the game, blowing the Bucks’ doors off late to come away with a 121-112 win that improved the Warriors to 26-1 on the season, gave them their 30th consecutive regular-season win within the friendly confines of Oracle, and pushed the Dubs to a phenomenal 18-13 over the past two seasons in games in which they’ve trailed by at least 10 points.
After the final whistle, though, neither side seemed willing to leave the animosity that’s developed between these two clubs between the white lines:
As described by ESPN.com’s Ethan Sherwood Strauss:
Green held up his hand as Mayo made contact with Green’s chest after the buzzer. The two then traded words, and Mayo touched the back of Green’s head. Green brushed off Mayo’s arm, and some pushing and shoving between the teams ensued.
After the game, the veteran Mayo (who scored 12 points on 3-for-11 shooting with four assists and three rebounds off the Bucks’ bench) and rising-star Green (who finished with 21 points, nine rebounds and eight assists, just missing his fourth triple-double of the season) offered differing perspectives on their postgame disagreement, according to Yahoo Sports NBA writer Marc J. Spears:
“There are different ways of getting your point across rather than going to the media bashing one of our brothers,” Mayo said. “At the end of the day, he felt that Michael [Carter-Williams] did something that wasn’t much class. He went even further with class speaking on our team situation. At the end of the day he’s a heck of a player. He’s had a heck of a career thus far and a big part of why they win ballgames. But keep it class. A lot of people follow what you say and what you do.
“He could have handled it different ways than going to the media. He’s in a position with a lot of attention on him. He’s bashing my brother.”
Said Green: “I’m not going to really talk about what guys talk about or say. What you think he said, he may not have said or may have said. But ain’t no man gonna touch my head. I’m a grown man.”
Update your files: the “Don’t Touch My Head, Man” list now includes Draymond as well as Chris Paul and Adrian Beltre. Its ranks overfloweth.
Head-touching and arguments about the relative classiness of discrete actions aside, the Bucks left Friday’s contest feeling much better than most clubs do after losing their third straight game to fall to 10-18 on the season.
“They hit shots and the tide turned,” Kidd said after the game, according to Josh Dubow of The Associated Press. “For us, a lot of good things came out of this. We competed. If we play with that kind of energy every time we take the court, we’ll win a lot more games.”
And the Warriors, despite avenging their lone loss of the season behind a furious fourth-quarter comeback, headed home feeling a bit worse than you’d expect for a 26-1 squad.
“I’m not satisfied because I thought we should have been better,” Green said. “We’re a long way past trying to beat the Milwaukee Bucks in December. We’re trying to compete for a championship.”
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Dan Devine is an editor for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
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