Golden State Warriors: 3 takeaways from Game 3 vs. Spurs

3. Warriors can care for ball when necessary

Turnovers have been considered the Warriors’ Achilles heel since Kerr took over. As dominant as their offense has been, it goes through periods of uncontrollable sloppiness.

The issue has never so much been one of ineptitude, but of indifference. These guys have fun out there, and seem to bank on their ability to hunker down when necessary. “Our gift is our curse,” Andre Iguodala told Kerith Burke of NBC Sports California after Game 3.

In this case, however, their gift — their immense talent and love for the game — was their gift. Aware that the Spurs would come out strong, the game plan appeared to be to weather the storm, and let their talent and execution eventually take over.

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To be sure, this has been Kerr’s pregame message dozens of times this season. This time, his team responded.

As expected, the Spurs were better all over the court. They defended harder, played with a purpose offensively and pounded the glass. Meanwhile, the Warriors went 0-for-5 from deep, and were being bombarded by a deafening crowd. They still ended the first quarter up 26-23, though, and that’s because they committed one turnover.

The second quarter featured more of the same from San Antonio, with an added outburst from Tony Parker. Yet the Warriors committed just three more turnovers, and went into halftime up 52-46.

Not only did the Warriors survive the storm, but they gave the Spurs clouds of their own. Being down six despite such cold Warriors shooting and such a strong first-half effort was dispiriting, and the Dubs were able to take control of the game over the final 24 minutes.

We know that Golden State can value the basketball, and that it works when it does. Hopefully, for the Warriors’ sake, they learned this lesson too.