CLEVELAND — Steve Kerr isn’t phased. The Warriors have been here too many times before. A Game 3 blowout loss now seems like a weekly routine.
But a 120-90 loss at the hands of the Cleveland Cavaliers stung badly. The Warriors didn’t downplay that fact. It’ll be a challenge to shake this losing feeling at Thursday’s practice.
“The coach deserves criticism, the players. I always tell our guys, that’s why we get paid. We don’t get paid to show up and shoot baskets every day,” Kerr said. “We get paid because we’re going to get a lot of criticism, and we deserve it tonight.”
While Steph Curry is receiving scrutiny from every angle, Kerr does not go unscathed in the 30-point loss either.
The Warriors did not lean heavily enough on their death lineup on Wednesday, even though it was having successful spurts. Draymond Green was +6 in 12 minutes at the center position in Game 3, and in the NBA Finals, he’s +38 when playing as the lead big man in 57 minutes. Those are significant numbers because when Green is playing well, the Warriors are typically winning the game. Lee Jenkins even profiled the death lineup this week in Sports Illustrated, describing the mental advantage the group of five impose on an opponent.
In Game 3, the death lineup — Curry, Klay Thompson, Andre Iguodala, Harrison Barnes and Green –played just a total of six minutes together. They were 5/7 for 11 points but turned the ball over five times, which likely peeved Kerr.
The indictment on Kerr is that he stuck with a true big man for too long in the game, even playing Anderson Varejao for 10 minutes. With Kevin Love out, Cleveland decided to shift LeBron to the four position, while using Richard Jefferson at the three. The results were staggering for the Warriors. The Cavaliers spread the floor with an array of shooters instead of rebounders, almost mimicking the way Golden State plays at Oracle Arena. It worked. And it sounds like Cleveland will continue to play the 35-year-old Jefferson heavy minutes, regardless if Love returns or not.
“I gave the game ball to RJ,” LeBron said. “Getting the start tonight with Kevin being out, he just came in with so much aggression, so much attention to detail. He was on the glass. He gave us eight rebounds and nine points. But some of the things that he was doing out on the floor did not show up in the boxscore.”
Per Synergy stats, the Warriors’ starting lineup is -22 in 25 minutes this series. Perhaps this is the signal that it’s time to start Iguodala over Andrew Bogut.
Kerr disagreed.
“We thought Boges played well,” Kerr said about his center, who finished with 4 points and 2 rebounds in 12 minutes. “Boges has done a good job for us in the series We didn’t feel like we had to match what they were doing because of their change in their starting lineup. We can always make a quick substitution. So I don’t think that had anything to do with losing the game. It wasn’t lineups. It wasn’t substitution patterns. We just got our tail kicked.”
The lingering problem for the Warriors, is that they’ve never had a halftime lead on the road this postseason. Not once in eight games, and that includes two against the lowly Houston Rockets. Continually playing from behind the gun is not only mentally taxing, it’s dangerous. At this point, Kerr doesn’t owe any playing time to veterans. He needs to shorten the rotation leash and use the best possible combination to stop the Cavs — and that’s the lineup of death.
When pressed whether or not he thinks he should start on Friday in Game 4, Iguodala was in no mood to put on Kerr’s coaching hat.
“We’ve had some success with the starting lineup we’ve had,” Iguodala said. “They beat us on the boards pretty well tonight. It’s definitely important for Bogut to establish that presence and be out there with the starting group. We’ve just got to have a better flow about our game on both ends.”
In Game 7 of the Oklahoma City series, Kerr made the tough call of sitting down Harrison Barnes for Iguodala. he even called GM Bob Myers about it, wondering if it was the right call. It ended up being the right matchup to win the Western Conference.
As he and the coaching staff draw up the game plan and rotations for Friday night’s Game 4, you better believe there will be heavy discussions on whether it’s time to insert Iguodala for Bogut in the starting lineup. And if they do pull the trigger on this lineup change, just like last year, it could be the turning point in winning a second consecutive title.
