Why Warriors’ next three games are exactly what they need originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
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Now that they’ve gotten through the relative cheesecloth portion of the schedule and reached the pinnacle of success, the Warriors are up against the wall. Or rather: a series of three walls.
“We love the beginning; a 6-1 win exceeds our expectations,” coach Steve Kerr told reporters Monday night in Washington after a 125-112 win over the Wizards. “We also know that our schedule has been kind to us. We played against some teams that were injured. We played against some young teams.
“It’s going to be much more difficult. The rest of this week we’re actually playing the three best teams in the league. I am pleased with our progress, but we still have a lot of work to do.”
They head to Boston on Wednesday to take on the defending champion Celtics, who are 7-1 with an average winning differential of 14 points.
They then head to Cleveland, where they will meet the undefeated Cavaliers (8-0) on Friday.
Golden State’s five-game road trip ends Sunday in Oklahoma City against the undefeated Thunder (7-0), who finished atop the Western Conference last season and hold the same position in the current standings.
The Warriors won’t see a tougher three-game stretch this season, but this is a perfect time for an early test of status. To check the strength of their assets, take a close look at their weaknesses and return to the laboratory with the right focus. Whether they win all three games, lose all three or finish somewhere in between, this won’t tell them who they are until early November.
That’s not who they want to be in March and beyond.
“This is game seven and right now we’re trying to put together a great season,” Draymond Green said at Capital One Arena. “So for us, it’s not necessarily about the team we’re playing, or how hard they play, or the lack thereof. It’s about us. And coming out and establishing the identity of the team we want to be for 82 games and then on to the playoffs.
The Warriors have learned a lot about themselves through their first seven games. They are deep, capable of excellent defense and it clearly shows spirit of the corps. Kerr has lineup and rotation flexibility and can target more legitimate shooting threats than even the teams that reached five consecutive NBA Finals and won three.
What Golden State doesn’t know is how it will respond to teams that are superior on paper and in the minds of those who follow the league. The Warriors are invading places they vacated last season, losing by 52 on their last visit to Boston, by 11 on their last trip to Cleveland and in overtime on their last stop in OKC.
We’ve already seen enough to reasonably conclude that these Warriors are better than the team that finished 46-36 last season and not only missed the playoffs but got blown off the floor in the Play-In tournament game.
But it’s hard to measure them until they step on the floor against real contenders. They’ve defeated three rebuilding teams — the Trail Blazers, the Jazz, the Wizards — and they’ve put away the deeply wounded Pelicans twice.
“We’re defining who we want to be,” Green said. “We want to be a great defensive team. We want to come out and pick up the pace. And we want to keep our turnover low. Historically, we’ve been a team that has turned the ball over a lot, and that has fallen on myself and Steph (Curry)’s shoulders.
“The coach has challenged us to change from a team that turned the ball over a lot and made the decisions, we are allowed to make those kinds of tests and push the line a little not to make those decisions. To be solid. And that is the mentality that we use.” what we come out with.”
Getting Curry back and giving him a warm-up game against the Wizards should give a better idea of Golden State’s potential over these three games. After playing 24 minutes, scraping off the rust early and shining later, he declared he was ready to move up.
“We have three strong teams and we want to keep building the momentum,” he said. “So I’m sure I’ll play more. But I feel good enough to do it.”
Ever cautious, Kerr came prepared with a cheat sheet his team will need. He wants tighter offensive execution and more disruptive defensive pressure. He wants the Warriors to be at their best, but he needs to know that’s unlikely.
After finishing sixth and tenth in the West the past two seasons, the Warriors’ goal is to win as many games as necessary to finish in the top six in the West, earning a spot in the playoffs guaranteed.
“Winning a championship or competing for a championship is a year-long process,” Green said. “And we’re just trying to embrace that process and hopefully ultimately give ourselves a chance.”
Regardless of Golden State’s next three results, the sky will not shine and it will not fall into the Earth’s core. They want to know how they are doing, but this boils down to an exam at the beginning of the semester.
You want to win it, but there is plenty of time for a comeback.
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