DURANT SAYS IT’S US, NOT ME
Curry spices up opener for amped up Nets
Revenge is a dish best served cool. It’ll be below 40 degrees outside by the time the Nets and Warriors kickoff their seasons at Barclays Center on Tuesday, and Warriors head coach Steve Kerr knows what’s on the table.
The Nets are a bona fide super team, led by Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving and loaded with one of the deepest rosters in all of basketball. Kerr used to coach Durant as part of a star-studded Golden State team that rattled off three championships in a four-year span, with Durant winning NBA Finals MVP in the latter two of their chips.
This particular dose of karma has been a long time coming.
“I probably deserve this given that I was coaching a team like that for five years,” Kerr said, laughing. “So it’s probably about time I have to face this where you’ve got all these weapons, all these players who can hurt you. Obviously Kevin and Kyrie, but so many of their support players are capable of having huge nights.
“We know what we’re in for in terms of a team that is capable of exploding like they did against Boston the other night, so we’ve got to be ready. The only thing you can do is try to lock-in on your keys and take away the easy stuff: not give them transition buckets where they get behind the play, where you’re just giving up something without even a fight. You’ve got to be ready to battle every possession and make things difficult.” Even that might not help.
The Nets project to be one of the best offensive teams in basketball. Nets head coach Steve Nash says the priority in Brooklyn is not out-gunning the Warriors. It’s continuing to prioritize the defensive end, with no better challenge than containing a two-time league MVP.
Nash’s Nets will start the season with a daunting task: getting a hold of Curry, who returned for preseason play after a broken wrist ended his season after just five games last year.
“He’s one of the all-time greats and we have to pay a lot of attention to him. He’s special. This season, with Klay (Thompson) being out, he’s going to shoot from everywhere and early and often. That’s the way it should be because he is really the greatest shooter of all-time,” Nash said. “We have to be diligent with our talk and our support and be up at the level and be able to not give him as many clean looks as possible and to make him work for what he does get.”
The Nets aren’t going to get off easy. Thompson is out for the season after rupturing his Achilles during an offseason workout, but the Warriors re-upped by adding Kelly Oubre Jr. and drafting big man James Wiseman, while also keeping Andrew Wiggins in tow. Draymond Green will not play due to a foot injury, but the Nets will have to account for Curry, who will be doubly aggressive and potentially an MVP candidate this season with so much of the Warriors’ offensive load on his shoulders.
DeAndre Jordan says the team is practicing its defensive schemes against its own stars, and what better barometer for defensive efficiency than attempting to slow down two of the best scorers in league history.
“We’re throwing different things out there, showing different defenses to Ky, Kev, and Caris (LeVert) and Spencer (Dinwiddie) that they may see in the season, and also working on some stuff that we may possibly use,” Jordan said. “Everything that we do in practice
is something that we want to try to incorporate in a game, and also it helps our offensive guys see different looks. Anything we’re doing, we’re trying to better ourselves.”
If the Nets can slow down Curry and keep a still talented Warriors team to below 100 points — like they did in their landslide preseason win over Boston — it will be a sign that the defense is on the right path, that a potent offense is only a few steps ahead of a defense that is still being constructed and implemented on the fly.
If they can’t slow down Curry — as few have proven able to — they’ll need to rely on their talent on the offensive end. That shouldn’t be a problem. The Nets have enough of it to make Kerr see ghosts of Christmas past.