In what should not be a surprise to anyone, Spurs star small forward Kawhi Leonard has officially been ruled out for the postseason as he continues to rehab his injured quadricep back to full strength.
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Klay Thompson led the way with 27 points on 11-13 shooting as the Warriors opened the Playoffs in dominating fashion with a 113-92 win over the San Antonio Spurs Saturday afternoon at Oracle.
The Warriors used an unorthodox starting line-up that included center JaVale McGee and Andre Iguodala at point guard, in addition to usual starters Kevin Durant, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green. More often than not, Aldridge’s teammates would pass on the opportunity and would simply give the ball back to Aldridge, who, by then, was 18 feet from the basket.
The Warriors now lead the series 1-0, and while Gregg Popovich will make adjustments, it’s hard to imagine what he could do with the players at his disposal that would change the outcome of this series with the way the Warriors have dialed in.
The Warriors’ Game 1 performance was both commonplace and incredible. The key to covering will be on the defensive end, which is where the Spurs are at a much bigger disadvantage.
Curry is still out and will remain out throughout the remainder of the first round with a grade 2 left MCL sprain. Curry, who suffered a knee injury just weeks before the post-season, is not expected to return in the first round of the 2018 NBA Playoffs.
Curry, who missed Golden State’s last 10 regular-season contests after the March 23 setback, will intensify his rehabilitation work in the next few days with more running and lateral movement, the team said in a statement. We were aggressive, played very well.
Starting Spurs point guard Dejounte Murray agreed with Popovich’s “deer-in-headlights” assessment.
San Antonio couldn’t keep up with Golden State from the opening tip. Thompson buried five of his six 3-point attempts as the Warriors shot 54.3 percent from the field and 45.5 percent from long range. That’s how the Spurs started the game.
“We gotta protect Steph from himself and make sure he’s good and healthy”. I think the whole point of these games early in the series is to establish our defense. Game 1 was no exception as he shot 8-of-17 from the floor for 24 points in 32 minutes, also adding eight rebounds and seven assists. “Today we anxious about the present, came out with a good game plan and executed it”.
We knew the Spurs would throw a counterpunch – we just didn’t know it would be a literal one.
The veteran point guard was terrible in Game 1 as he finished with just two points on 1-of-8 shooting and was a team-worst minus-17 in just 13 minutes. In the first half, MeGee had 11 points on 4-of-5 shooting plus a couple of blocked shots inside.
Reserve Rudy Gay led the Spurs with 15 points while LaMarcus Aldridge and Bryn Forbes each added 14 for San Antonio. He shared game-high assist honors with Durant with eight.
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“He hit some tough shots off one leg and you know had some opportunity bounces”, Aldridge said. The Spurs did not have enough to counter the Warriors’ depth.
