WHERE SPECIAL, EXPECTED MEET
The Warriors are going to miss this place.
We’re a long way from the fall of 2019, when the defending NBA champions move into their new San Francisco arena in Mission Bay, but there’s a growing air of nostalgia around Oracle Arena, where the Warriors defeated the Cleveland Cavaliers 122-103 Sunday night to take a 2-0 lead in the Finals.
In short, Oakland ain’t San Francisco — and that’s a two-way street.
This is the fourth straight season the Warriors have engaged Cleveland for the NBA championship, and Oracle hasn’t lost a bit of its charm — or its effect on the opposition. The Warriors aren’t unbeatable in the storied old building, but there are nights when the sheer beauty of Stephen Curry’s performance defines the evening. And the team. And, really, the entire league.
This was one of those nights. Curry hit nine of his trademark three-point shots, setting a Finals record and sending the crowd into a frenzy. He scored 33 points overall, and he lit up the emotional scoreboard as well.
Two years ago, when the Cavaliers invaded Oracle and shockingly won Game 7 of the Finals, Curry wasn’t himself. He missed four three-pointers during the crucial final four minutes, and he couldn’t shake the lumbering presence of
Kevin Love, the Cavaliers forward not known for his defense.
“Wow, what a job by Love!” people claimed, but no. Curry struggled through that game with an injured knee, and his legendary dribbling expertise was an ally gone missing.
Switch now to the fourth quarter Sunday night. There was Love, once again, hounding Curry. And there was the fabled Splash Brother, getting some rippling revenge.
First came a shot straight out of Curry’s highlight reel, a litany of the improbable. Momentarily losing the ball when confronted by Love, Curry simply stepped back and lofted a 29-footer with wildly exaggerated height, and it dropped straight in for a 10389 lead.
“A cool moment, for sure,” Curry admitted. Not long thereafter, Love could merely lunge in futility as Curry hit a three-pointer from the far right corner — and just about brought the house down.
Beyond all that, Curry has been downright feisty in the war of words. In Game 1, when LeBron James tossed a few choice words his way, Curry barked right back with a smile. On Sunday, Curry heard a bit too much trashtalking from Kendrick Perkins, for years among the league’s toughest characters but strictly a spectator at Oracle, having failed to make the Cavaliers’ active roster.
Curry didn’t just yell at Perkins. He went over to the Cavaliers’ bench in the third quarter and got right in his face. Postgame explanation? “Much ado about nothing,” said Curry, temporarily closing the case.
On an evening of vintage team play, it would be foolish to focus entirely on Curry. The contributors came in waves, from Kevin Durant to JaVale McGee to Shaun Livingston. But set aside a tribute to Klay Thompson, who left the arena with 34 minutes and 20 points in his wake.
There were serious questions about Thompson’s availability. He went down with a high ankle sprain in Thursday night’s Game 1 collision with J.R. Smith, and that’s a troubling ailment. It tends to linger, rendering athletes unable to make sharp, unexpected cuts and preferring more reasonable journeys — like from the couch to the refrigerator.
Thompson is a different kind of cat (if his dog, Rocco, will pardon the expression). He grew up scrapping on athletic fields with his two brothers, the action about as subtle as a rugby scrum, and took pride in his resilience. There was hardly an injury he couldn’t shake off. Coach Steve Kerr calls Thompson “a machine” in terms of physical toughness, and he had played in all 99 of the Warriors’ playoff games in the Kerr era.
He wasn’t about to miss this one.
“Feels like I was on the training table for three straight days,” Thompson deadpanned after the game. “Something I’m not used to.”
“I saw him yesterday, saw his ankle,” said Draymond Green, “and I thought there was way he’s playing. He’s like, ‘I’m good, I’m cool,’ but he was lyin’. Then he comes out tonight and scores 20. That’s a microcosm of who he is: maybe the toughest guy, if not toughest guy I’ve ever played with.”
Is there any suspense left in this series? Well, there’s always the fashion parade, getting nuttier by the hour. On Thursday night James arrived at Oracle in a gray shorts suit, the absurdity of it all overshadowing the man’s natural look of royalty. On Sunday night, Green answered with a teal-and-black version — but James remained ahead of the game, adding red and white striped socks with bright white sneakers. (Not sure what the players are trying to say here, but we’ll be checking with their designers, Victor Vague and Conflicted Jones.)
So the series shifts now to Cleveland, a place forever warm in the Warriors’ hearts. It’s not a rockin’ metropolis, or even a toddlin’ town, but it’s where the Curry-Thompson-Green Warriors won their first championship on a June evening in 2015. They celebrated alone that night, drenched in Champagne, and many of them were awake to greet the sunrise.
Perhaps the Cavaliers can pull off a win over the next two games. It’s well within James’ realm, and it wouldn’t be so bad. That would bring the show back to Oakland, back to Oracle, where a lot of East Bay folks hope that final sunset never comes.