The Golden State Warriors held on to beat the Sacramento Kings 126-125 on Sunday in a heart-stopping Game 4. Here are three key reactions from the defending champions' wild, series-tying victory over De'Aaron Fox, Domantas Sabonis and company at Chase Center.
Warriors escape despite more crunch-time blunders
Stephen Curry's game-changing Chris Webber moment will get the most attention, and rightfully so.
The Warriors seemed bound for hard-fought victory after Klay Thompson—rock solid on both ends in Game 4—slid his feet with an ambitious Malik Monk in transition to force an off-balance, air-mailed runner with just under 50 seconds left. Kevon Looney secured the defensive board and quickly shuffled the ball to the greatest shooter ever, his team up five points and the opposition forced to play the foul game.
Rather than welcoming the double-team to play keep away from Sacramento, though, Curry dribbled into it and quickly called timeout—completely unaware the Warriors didn't have any remaining.
Steph Curry called a timeout when the Warriors had no timeouts left 🤯
The Kings were given a technical free throw and possession of the ball down only 5 points 👀pic.twitter.com/SR9FBELSn1
— ClutchPoints (@ClutchPointsApp) April 23, 2023
There's no excuse for Curry's gaffe. Every player on the floor is inherently tasked with knowing their team's timeout situation in crunch-time, especially when possessing the ball and holding a slim lead.
Harrison Barnes' game-winning try from deep as time expired landed just long, making this first-round epic a best-of-three. But Curry's inexcusable mistake is what put the Warriors in that extremely fragile position in the first place, an effective six-point swing—after Monk's technical free throw and De'Aaron Fox's subsequent pull-up triple—that wouldn't have happened if he'd simply remembered the cardinal rule of playing in the clutch.
Curry, remember, also should've known Golden State was out of timeouts due to in-game context. Perhaps believing too much in the Dubs' “moral compass,” Steve Kerr used his only challenge on Looney's moving screen in dribble hand-off action with Thompson as the game clock read 2:14. Looney's immediate and vociferous lobbying for the green light notwithstanding, no one should've needed a replay to know this was an offensive foul.
How the Warriors coaching staff could possibly have deemed it prudent to risk their lone remaining timeout by challenging such a clear offensive foul is anyone's guess—the type of miscalculation that would've dogged Kerr among Dubs die-hards forever if Barnes' last-second triple splashed through, putting Golden State's dynasty on its last leg down 3-1 in the first round.
Maybe Golden State's bench was still left glassy-eyed and slack-jawed from this mind-numbingly awful turnover by Jordan Poole some 30 seconds of game time earlier?
Curry's rushed, leaning runner with 15 seconds left and the Warriors clinging to a one-point lead pulled from the same thread of bad late-game decision-making.
Why not let the shot clock bleed before launching, forcing the Kings to win or tie the game with just a few seconds left? Curry's early miss gave Sacramento a full 10.5 seconds to play with coming out of a timeout, more than enough time to set up multiple actions and move the ball.
Golden State doesn't need to apologize for hanging on. All that matters now is the Warriors did their job at home, holding serve just like Sacramento at Golden 1 Center—both teams just narrowly avoiding buzzer-beating game-winners.
But no matter what happens from here, playing against the Kings or deeper into the postseason while vying for an unprecedented fifth championship in nine years, the Dubs must make better decisions in crunch-time. Unfortunately, nothing the Warriors did over the 82-game grind suggests they will.
Welcome back Draymond Green
Green didn't start in his return from suspension, Golden State opting to reward Looney for a monster Game 3 and, more importantly, keep the floor spread offensively by opening with four shooters. Finishing always looms largest, though, and Green's fingerprints were all over the Warriors' season-saving victory in the clutch.
This possession, right after Curry called a timeout the Dubs didn't have, died because of Green's unreal blend of length, quickness and anticipation while swiping Fox's dribble one-on-one.
There might not be anyone in NBA history—certainly no player his size—who's more disruptive dealing with 2-on-1 at the rim than Green. But he normally faces that losing numbers game in relative calm of the halfcourt, not frenzy of the open floor.
These stops belong on Draymond's Hall-of-Fame resumé when the time comes.
Golden State, amazingly, didn't score for the last one minute and 25 seconds of Sunday's game, Curry clanking two jumpers and giving Sacramento an extra possession by calling timeout and drawing an automatic technical.
The advantage is created by Curry, naturally, but this is exactly the 4-on-3 situation Green and Looney have struggled to navigate consistently versus the Kings—and an example of why the Warriors opened Game 4 with maximum floor-spacing. Green catches on the roll and takes a dribble before jump-stopping, playing off two feet to maintain control and create just enough time for Andrew Wiggins to cut from the weak-side corner.
He couldn't have played it any better.
Green labored as a finisher in those confines from the opening tip, also a bit thirsty from the perimeter en route to 12 points on 3-of-14 shooting. But he thrived playmaking in that open space and was everywhere defensively, leading Kerr to call Green's number to open the second half alongside Looney.
Green's canny short-roll passing and remarkable on-ball screening chemistry with Curry—most memorably exemplified midway through the fourth quarter by an inverted pick-and-roll that ended with Curry stepping behind Green's dribble hand-off for an open triple—is what kept Golden State's two-big lineups viable offensively. The Warriors went back to that traditional look because Fox absolutely abused them in the first half, though, needing Green's all-court versatility to help slow him down.
Mission accomplished, at least until the newly minted Clutch Player of the Year did what he does best in the final stanza.
The Dubs began the second half with Green as Fox's primary defender, switching most on-ball actions with Wiggins and Looney involved in the play. Green never quite put true clamps on Fox in isolation, but Golden State just changing up its defensive coverage finally threw Sacramento's budding superstar out of rhythm.
Fox scored five points on 1-of-6 shooting in the third quarter, crucial to the Warriors turning a four-point deficit into a 10-point lead entering the fourth.
Green didn't start on Sunday, but it was no surprise he was on the floor to finish. It'll be fascinating to see how Golden State not only starts in Game 5, but manages the rotation throughout the action at Golden 1 Center. Playing Green alongside Looney and Wiggins was the Dubs' only answer for Fox and the Kings in Game 4, yet there's no denying their offense flows much better with only one big on the floor.
Good thing Kerr has until Wednesday night to figure it out.
Jordan Poole comes to the party
Poole's individual performance, by the way, had little to do with the Golden State's choice to start Green and often play big in the second half. He was targeted defensively and had a couple rough turnovers, but still put together by far his best performance of the playoffs on Sunday—no surprise considering pre-game talk of his sprained left ankle being almost fully healed.
Poole's 22 points, two rebounds and four assists on 9-of-15 shooting in Game 4 don't quite do his real-time impact justice. His off-dribble burst restored, Poole put consistent pressure on the rim offensively, drawing a handful of fouls to get the Warriors in the bonus and making the defense scramble before finding the open man.
There were three separate times on Sunday—all in the second half—that Poole, giving Sacramento a taste of its own medicine, raced right through a barely set defense for layups.
The Warriors are simply a different team when Poole plays like he did in Game 4. Ankle issue in the rearview mirror, his play over the first-round's remainder could be the X-factor that swings what's become an instant-classic series toward Golden State for good.
Follow Us
Subscribe