The NBA Finals have returned to The Bay, but not exactly in glorious fashion.
After more than two years, a move to a new arena across the way and a new, much younger group of players, the Warriors have made their return to the playoff finale that’s been their stomping ground for five-straight years.
But in Game 1, the result was a disaster of epic proportions. A 15-point lead turned into a 120-108 loss. This marks just the third time ever the Warriors have lost a Game 1 under Steve Kerr.
Celtics’ nonsensical shooting washes out Warriors
At one point in the third quarter, the Warriors led the game by 15 points. That lead evaporated by the fourth quarter when the Celtics shot the ball as effectively as any team ever in the playoffs, let alone in the Finals.
To open the fourth quarter, Boston was a perfect 7-for-7 from deep, with everyone, from Jaylen Brown, to Derrick White to Al Horford hitting shots.
This was all while Jayson Tatum went an astonishingly poor 3-for-17 from the field, scoring 12 points. That’s a fact that should make Warriors fans gulp.
And it wasn’t like these were just lucky shots. The Warriors’ defense crumbled, as the Celtics’ ball movement exploited openings and left wide open three after wide open three to find the bottom of the net.
Horford had 26 points on 9-of-12 from the field and 6-of-8 from 3.
Brown had 24 points on 10-of-23 from the field and 2-of-8 from 3 with some key fourth quarter buckets to spur the run.
Derrick White(!) had 21 of his own, going 6-of-11 from the field and 5-of-8 from deep.
Smart had 18 points on 7-of-11 from the field and 4-of-7 from deep.
Even Payton Pritchard hit a couple threes of his own. As a team, Boston went an outrageous 21-of-41 from 3.
The series was billed to be so much about defense, and at the end of the day, it was, just not in the way expected. Boston exploited a Warriors defense that left an innumerable number of openings, and punished them for it.
Stephen Curry’s stellar night goes to waste
There has been a smorgasbord of bad sports talk leading up to this series, so much of it revolving around Stephen Curry and his lack of a Finals MVP.
It’s a topic that’s only been given attention because of the implicit understanding that Curry is one of the greatest players of all time, so it’s strange he’s never won a Finals MVP.
In other words, Curry is too dominant to not win one. At this point, it feels like if the Warriors win the championship, it would be difficult for him not to take that honor.
On Thursday, Curry made a compelling opening argument that the award should be his this time around.
He went scorched earth in the first quarter, tallying 21 points and setting a Finals record with six threes in one quarter in the first.
There are games when Curry waits to get his usual, roughly 30-point tally. That was not the case on Thursday, when he took over from the jump.
When things were stagnant, he remained persistent, getting to his spot inside and facilitating from multiple spots.
But Curry couldn’t do enough on his own to bring the Warriors back from one of the worst fourth quarters they’ve ever had. And he wasn’t the first half supernova version of himself in the fourth. He couldn’t be when the rest of the Warriors were struggling, and Jordan Poole presented no threat whatsoever.
Jordan Poole’s over-dribbling, Draymond’s struggles and the perils of the Celtics’ defense
By the end of the first half, there was a tangible anxiety in the air. That was over the fact that Curry was carrying the offense, had scored 21 points, and the Warriors were trailing.
It turns out that anxiety was well founded, despite the third quarter run that followed.
Klay Thompson was making shots in the first half, but that third option, in Jordan Poole, looked absolutely lost.
Poole has at times looked like the NBA’s next great scorer, someone with the panache and creative joy that is extremely similar to his mentor in Curry.
But there are so many bad habits that plague him, especially against elite, physical defenses. He still shows that he has a proclivity towards over-dribbling, and a bizarre habit of driving into the paint, losing track of where he is, and turning it over.
Against a defense with the collective intelligence, persistence, length and athleticism of the Celtics, that is not a viable recipe for success. And he cost the Warriors on multiple occasions.
He had 9 points on just 2-for-7 from the field and 1-for-5 from deep, turning it over a team-high four times.
Poole was costly, and so, too, was Draymond Green. Green was guarded largely by Smart, who took on the sort of safety role that allowed him to rotate off Green when he needed.
While he provided value in multiple facets as usual, it wasn’t enough to outweigh the putrid shooting night he had, tallying just 4 points on 2-for-12 shooting, 0-for-4 from deep and missing all three of his free throws.
Andrew Wiggins remained impressive, with 20 points, Thompson added 15, and there were even 12 points from Otto Porter Jr. with four 3s. But with a defense that faltered, the Warriors became predictable in the late minutes while the Celtics went scorched earth.
