Warriors need to follow Durant’s lead.
HOUSTON >> The highlight shows have replayed Stephen Curry’s missed dunk, botched layups and missed 3’s. As they have reviewed their loss to the Houston Rockets in Game 3 of the Western Conference semifinals, the Warriors have focused instead on rewatching all of the times they missed a rebound.
So when the Warriors play against the Rockets in Game 4 tonight, they expressed more concern about their work on the glass than Curry’s 7-of23 clip in Game 3.
“You can make it about the Steph missed dunk or different things like that. But the fact of the matter is I don’t think we deserved to be in that game,” Draymond Green said on Sunday. “They outplayed us the entire game. They executed better. They outhustled us.”
Nowhere was that more apparent than the Warriors’ effort on the boards. The Rockets outrebounded the Warriors 55-35, winning the battle on the offensive glass 17-7. Warriors coach Steve Kerr observed “that’s a pretty good indication that team played with more force.”
And the Warriors? Unlike in Games 1 and 2, they played admittedly as if they felt more comfortable after opening the series with a 2-0 lead. Instead of forcing the Rockets to become the first NBA team in playoff history to overcome a 3-0 deficit, the Warriors allowed the Rockets to stay in the series.
“Everybody is talking about how the series is over and we’re going to win. There is a tendency to relax,” Green said. “You know they’re going to come up and play like their lives depend on it. They played with a different sense of desperation than we did.”
Rockets forward PJ Tucker (12 rebounds) and center Clint Capela (11) logged double-digit in rebounds, while Green (11) represented the lone Warriors player to nearly match them. Kevon Looney became plagued with foul trouble (four). Andrew Bogut (one) and Jonas Jerebko (one) did little in giving the Warriors any depth at center. Green (four) and Klay Thompson (two) are the lone Warriors’ starters to grab any offensive rebounds.
In Games 1 and 2, the Warriors showed appeared more eager to clean the glass. The Warriors outrebounded the Rockets, 38-26, in Game 1, while also grabbing more offensive rebounds (8-3). In Game 2, the Warriors duplicated their effort overall (45-41) and offensively (1810). The Warriors vowed to duplicate those numbers in Game 4. As Pat Riley once said as the Los Angeles Lakers’ head coach during the Showtime Era, “No rebound; no ring.”
“When you’re on the road against a great team, you can’t expect to win with the level of focus or lack of focus we had,” Kerr said. “Too many mindless plays defensively.”
Those mistakes can multiply considering the Rockets’ offensive system.
With Houston prioritizing taking even contested 3’s over open 2’s, the Warriors have told their guards to chase long rebounds. They also tell every defender to box out and turn their eyes toward the rim. With the Rockets grabbing more missed shots in Game 3, they had more 3’s points made (18-14) and 3-point attempts (42-33). The longer the range, the more difficult it became for the Warriors to chase the missed attempt.
“It’s certainly trending that way not only with the volume of 3’s but the distance of the threes, which spaces the floor even more,” Kerr said. “That makes your help defense that much more difficult.”
Kerr lamented the Warriors giving the Rockets four free throws at the end of regulation. The Warriors are measuring to what extent they should double team James Harden, who had 41 points on 14of-32 shooting in Game 3. They also seem conflicted on how much their focus should be on Chris Paul (14 points on eight shots) when they also have to account for Eric Gordon (30 points).
The Warriors still considered their rebounding issues to be more pressing. In overtime, Houston outrebounded the Warriors, 4-1.
Green also observed that the Rockets “got every loose ball.”
The reason? Green noticed, “they were flying around and our defense broke down quite a bit.” Despite preaching the need to “box out and try hard,” Kerr observed that “we missed five or six pretty blatant” boxouts.
So before Kerr considers any rotation adjustments, he has stressed that old fashioned hard work on the glass will largely dictate whether the Warriors win in Game 4. The Warriors also believe that variable will play a bigger role than Curry rectifying a poor Game 3.
“What’s the adjustment? We have to box out. We have to rotate,” Kerr said. “We have to be in the right place at the right time. We have to anticipate what’s happening. We have to fight for every possession.”