Golden State Warriors: 5 Takeaways From Opening Night Disaster
3. Rebounding Is Another Possible Achilles Heel
The bench is probably Golden State’s biggest flaw, but San Antonio’s tall frontcourt line revealed another potential Achilles heel: rebounding.
The Warriors struggled on the boards at times last season, but Tuesday’s season opener took that to a whole new level. The Spurs out-rebounded Golden State by a massive 55-35 margin, turning 21 offensive boards into 26 second chance points.
Fastbreak points: SAS 24 Warriors 20
— Hardwood Paroxysm (@HPbasketball) October 26, 2016
2nd chance: SAS 26 Warriors 4.
The Warriors, by contrast, only had eight offensive boards for four second chance points. That’s never been how Golden State makes its money, but don’t forget how many back-breaking threes they dropped on teams last year as the result of an offensive rebound.
Green pulled down a team-high 12 boards and Durant chipped in 10 of his own, but those two accounting for 22 of the team’s 35 rebounds is unacceptable. Zaza Pachulia pulling down three boards after averaging 9.4 per game last season is unacceptable. And giving up eight boards to Dewayne Dedmon in 17 minutes, plus six rebounds to David Lee in 11 minutes, is unacceptable.
Pachulia has to be leagues better. Curry (three rebounds) and Klay Thompson (one) have to help out. And the bench (four total rebounds, compared to the Spurs bench’s 25) cannot be dominated on the glass like that again.