So much for the panic around the Golden State Warriors. The Dubs have won seven straight games and look to lock up the first seed in the Western Conference in the coming weeks.
Remember when the Golden State Warriors were mired in a “legendary slump” earlier this season? The Warriors went 2-5 at one point this year soon after losing Kevin Durant due to injury.
The losing streak dominated NBA headlines for a while. The Warriors were “struggling” and frustrated, and their “aura of invincibility gone.” Let’s be honest–those aren’t overly hot takes, given the context.
When a team wins 73 games and then adds a player like Kevin Durant, there are obviously going to be expectations. With echo chambers like Twitter working around the clock, those expectations can become ridiculous.
The truth is that it’s very tough to win 70-plus games in the first place, much less to accomplish that feat and then come back and dominate again. The Chicago Bulls won 72 games in the 1995-96 NBA season. The next year, they lost three of their final four games to end the season.
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Michael Jordan played in all of those games. Sometimes even historically good teams slump, briefly. Taking a crucial player out of the mix tends to exacerbate that possibility.
Golden State Warriors
Jordan and the Bulls bounced back from those late-season losses and beat the Utah Jazz in the NBA Finals that season. It remains to be seen if the Warriors can claim another NBA title, but at the moment it certainly seems like Golden State is back.
The Warriors haven’t lost a game since March 11. They’re 7-0 since that loss, to the annually dangerous San Antonio Spurs.
Those seven wins have seen the Warriors outscore their opposition by an average of 17.7 points per game and many of them have been ensured by the Dubs’ fantastic defense.
Golden State is holding teams to less than 95 points per game on this winning streak, far better than the 104.3 points per game the Warriors have given up to opposing teams on the season.
This recent run is fueling Draymond Green‘s Defensive Player of the Year case. With Draymond off of the floor, the Warriors have allowed 103.7 points per 100 possessions over this seven-game winning streak. That’s the worst mark among all Warriors.
With Draymond on the floor, Golden State is throttling teams defensively. The Dubs with Draymond have allowed just 89.2 points per 100 possessions over the last seven games.
He’s single-handedly keeping the Warriors as the NBA’s second-best defense as per net rating, even without Durant’s help.
Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson are both shooting 40 percent or better from the three-point arc in this recent stretch of games and the Splash Brothers are scoring just less than 50 combined points in that period.
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Those two nailing shots is to be expected. The other Warrior who is scoring more than 8.4 points per game besides Green, Curry and Thompson is Andre Iguodala, who has stepped up big time in Durant’s absence.
Iguodala is scoring 11.8 points per game on 60 percent shooting from the field and 44.4 percent three-point shooting in the last seven games. His past experience as an All-Star and team leader is certainly helping the Dubs stay on track to close the season out.
With Durant’s return being planned out now by Warriors head coach Steve Kerr, the Dubs are doing just fine to wrap this season up.
Golden State has a two-game lead over the Spurs and after a tough stretch of games upcoming the Dubs wrap up their season against the Minnesota Timberwolves, Phoenix Suns, New Orleans Pelicans, Utah Jazz and Los Angeles Lakers.
Out of that group only the Jazz have a winning record, with two of those teams shamelessly tanking. The Warriors are in good position now, one that will only be strengthened with Durant’s return to action.
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With the Cleveland Cavaliers‘ sudden inability to play defense, the Warriors are no longer the contender getting picked apart. That’s probably because there isn’t much to take issue with in the Bay Area right now, as far as basketball goes at least.