Warriors turn it on late, surge past impressive Rockets
The Golden State Warriors have been so impressive this season that it’s now standard practice to praise playoff teams for giving them any challenge whatsoever. For instance, the Oklahoma City Thunder are now identified as the team most likely to beat the defending champions in a playoff series because they played them reasonably well until crunch-time excellence guided the Warriors to an eight-point win on Saturday. Under most any circumstances, Golden State would have come out of that game as the team everyone talked about. But their dominance demands that we grade their opponents on a curve.
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By those standards, the Houston Rockets were quite good in Tuesday night’s visit to Oracle Arena. Down an absurd yet typical 42-27 after one quarter, the Rockets out-scored the Warriors 39-27 in the second period to close the gap and continued to impress to take a slight 93-90 lead entering the final minute of the third. The extended comeback was a reminder of everything the Rockets did well last season under Kevin McHale — running the offense through James Harden to great success, getting useful contributions from role players, and feeding off the defensive energy of Patrick Beverley to test the limits of the league’s elite.
As with so many Warriors opponents, though, they couldn’t do it for all four quarters. Golden State tied it back up on an Andre Iguodala three-pointer late in the third and scored the first eight points of the fourth for a game-changing 11-0 run. Harrison Barnes kept the lead strong with 17 fourth-quarter points (of 19 total) to help the Warriors close out the 123-110 win. Houston managed only 17 points in the quarter.
It’s arguable that the Rockets only stayed in the game because of the Warriors’ defensive indifference. There’s a point to that, because Golden State looked more spectacular even as Houston surged forward for the lead. This third-quarter fast break started with a Stephen Curry steal and led to a Leandro Barbosa lay-in so quickly that several involved Warriors seemed surprised by it all:
However, the Rockets still had to take advantage of those lulls. It’s hard to say that Houston may have found something here when they’ve been inconsistent all season, but their play in the second and third quarters at least proved that they can reach a quasi-contending level on occasion. With the bench contributing very little, James Harden took over to score a game-high 37 points (10-of-21 FG, 6-of-10 3FG, 11-of-13 FT):
Yet it takes significantly more to top the Warriors, even on a night that saw All-Stars Draymond Green and Klay Thompson struggle. Barnes’s late scoring was crucial, but Curry was the focal point with 35 points on 7-of-16 shooting from beyond the arc with nine assists:
All that concluded with a typical result — the Warriors have now won 42 straight at home, just two shy the Michael Jordan-led Chicago Bulls’ record. They play their next seven on the road, so we’ll have to wait until early March to see if they can continue the run.
It’s increasingly difficult to imagine anything that could derail them. Even a worst-case scenario involving Tuesday night’s worst news would put them into a familiar bind. Head coach Steve Kerr didn’t feel well after the game, which raises immediate concern (without much evidence, mind you) that he could be experiencing some of the discomfort that caused him to sit out the first 43 games of the season after complications from offseason back surgery.
The All-Star break could be coming at just the right time for Kerr and the Warriors. Not that they need any more help.
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Eric Freeman is a writer for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
