The Warriors Keep Their Season Alive And Force A Game 7
As I blogged here, you should have had some idea that what we just saw in the Warriors Game 6 win was possible. Just like back in 2016, facing elimination the Warriors not only showed up, they had a very familiar Klay Thompson performance that could not have come at a better time. This game pretty much went how your standard Warriors game goes. They let the opposition hang around and feel confident, you know like how the Rockets got off to the great start and led by as much as 17. But as we were reminded, it doesn’t matter how much you lead at the break, the Warriors are going to come out in the third quarter and flex on you.
Which is exactly what happened. It started with an 11-0 run, where not only were the Rockets pooping their pants missing threes and turning it over, but the Warriors took those miscues and made you pay. Klay three, Durant dunk, Klay three, Steph three is the exact way you change the momentum of this game and never really look back. At the end of the 12 minutes the Warriors had won the quarter 33-16, and had all the momentum in the world. As you watched it you thought maybe HOU had one more run in them to make this a competitive finish. Well, the Warriors got out to a 19-4 start to the fourth quarter and this was your standard Warriors home blowout before you knew it.
Just like back in that OKC series, the story of tonight for the Warriors has to be the night of the Splash Brothers. They had 72 points the last time they faced elimination, and tonight they were nearly as good with 64 points and 14 3PM. Klay went 9-14 and Steph 5-14 which was also very similar to that 2016 game, the one where Klay made 11 and Steph 6. This was that same old reminder that just when you think the Warriors are dead and buried, they make it rain. When the Warriors are making shots like they did tonight, and you combine it with the do it all performance of Draymond who had a nice 4/10/9/4/5 and +27, GS is nearly impossible to beat. You could argue the Rockets really did end up feeling the absence of Chris Paul because when things were getting out of control, they didn’t have anyone who could settle things down.
If you’re the Rockets, you definitely feel like you let things slip away given how you started. Harden clearly got a little tired and had a tough 10-24, and his 9 TOs sure didn’t help things. The good news is nobody really thought they could win this game anwyays, so really things just went according to plan. You still get to go home where you just won with an opportunity to close it out. They may be stressed about it but as a basketball fan I can’t wait. It’s only right that this series between the two best teams all year goes the distance.
Two Conference Finals Game 7s. What did we do to be so blessed.