“I just try to tell myself that I’m at my best when I don’t care what happens after the game, the outcome or anything,” Durant said. “That’s when I’m free and having fun out there, and forceful.”
Durant scored Golden State’s first two baskets on his way to 38 points on 15-of-27 shooting, and the Warriors routed the host New Orleans Pelicans, 118-92, on Sunday to take a commanding three-games-to-one lead in their Western Conference semifinal series.
The Warriors can advance to the conference finals with a win at home on Tuesday night.
Warriors guard Stephen Curry said it was apparent early that getting the ball to Durant would be wise.
“Just find ways to get him in scoring positions,” said Curry, who had 23 points. “Sometimes, that’s not really hard to do — just throw it to him.”
The Warriors lost by 19 in Game 3 on Friday, and the Pelicans were looking to even the series. Instead, the Warriors responded with a resounding effort that produced a wire-to-wire win with leads as large as 26 points. Klay Thompson scored 13 points, and Quinn Cook, a former Pelicans reserve, contributed 12.
Draymond Green had 8 points, 9 rebounds, 9 assists, 4 steals and 2 blocks. With his fourth rebound, Green became the third player in Warriors history to reach 800 playoff rebounds. Wilt Chamberlain (922) and Nate Thurmond (896) are the only others.
Anthony Davis had 26 points and 12 rebounds for New Orleans, but the Pelicans hit only 36 percent (32 of 88) of their shots from the field, missing 22 of 26 3-point attempts.
Pelicans Coach Alvin Gentry said Golden State’s defense had a lot to do with his team’s poor shooting.
“We didn’t have the looks we normally have,” he said. “We pressed a little bit when we got behind.”
E’Twaun Moore scored 20 and Jrue Holiday added 19, but New Orleans reserves combined for just 14 points after scoring 32 two nights earlier. Rajon Rondo finished with 11 rebounds but had only six assists after racking up 21 in Game 3. The Pelicans also committed 19 turnovers, which led to 21 Warriors points.
It’s the only blip on an otherwise flawless four-year postseason resume for the Warriors: A Game 7 loss to Cleveland in 2016, which soured a potential 3-peat that would have placed Golden State alongside only the Celtics, Bulls and Lakers in the annals of NBA history.
And as great as it was, what do people say about that series? Of course LeBron James and Kyrie Irving were phenomenal, but when breaking down why the Warriors fell short, a common rationale is repeated ad nauseam: “Well, Steph wasn’t himself.”
Ugh. The 2016 NBA Finals is one of the best battles we’ve seen in professional sports, and it forever has a “what if” attached to it — justified or not.
Stephen Curry slipped on the court during Game 4 of the opening round against the Rockets that year, suffering a Grade 1 MCL sprain. He missed just four games before he returned, and the common consensus is that he may have rushed back, that he never fully recovered for the eventual loss to the Cavs in Game 7. Without a fully healthy Curry (remember, this was pre-Kevin Durant), the Warriors lost by the narrowest of margins.
That’s why it was so important to see the old Curry during Golden State’s 113-104 Game 5 win over the Pelicans, bouncing around, cutting hard off of screens, finishing in traffic. Curry scored 28 points in 37 minutes on 10-of-16 shooting, slowly regaining his super powers with every ovation from the raucous and eager Oracle crowd. It’s well documented how the two-time MVP makes life easier for his teammates, and that was on full display in the closeout win over New Orleans.
“You see, when you let the dog off the leash what happens,” Durant said of Curry’s 37 minutes. “We’re going to need him to continue to be aggressive and we’ll live with anything after that.”
He may have rejoined the lineup a few games ago, but now the old Curry has officially returned, and there aren’t going to be any asterisks when it comes to the highly anticipated Western Conference finals against the Rockets — at least not because of this injury.
Golden State Warriors’ Stephen Curry (30) takes a shot against New Orleans Pelicans’ Anthony Davis (23) in the first half of Game 4 of the NBA Western Conference semifinals at the Smoothie King Center in New Orleans, LA, on Sunday, May 6, 2018.
The Warriors — wisely, in retrospect — held Curry out the first six games of the 2018 postseason with a Grade 2 MCL sprain in his left knee, after he had already missed the final 10 contests of the regular season. Though Curry was aching and itching to get back on the court earlier, you can’t help but think that the organization had those 2016 Finals in mind when deciding to keep him out that extra bit, just to be sure.
The results couldn’t have worked out better for the Warriors, who needed only five games each to dispatch the Spurs and the Pelicans, and they now look to be at full strength, peaking when it matters most, as they head into their showdown with Houston. And just for good measure, both teams will have five days of rest before the series starts on Monday.
Both the Warriors and Rockets are coming into this series healthy and clicking — just watch the highlights of Chris Paul eviscerating the Jazz in the final minutes of their own elimination game just hours before the Warriors’ victory — and the stage is set for the showdown we’ve been anticipating since Paul was traded to Houston back in July.
Golden State has met little resistance from the West over the past four seasons, and Houston finally looks to be the worthy adversary that critics of the NBA’s lack of parity have been clamoring for. The last thing we needed was any reason to detract from the series, and a banged-up Steph would have been exactly that. If he’s not 100 percent, he’s certainly doing a great job hiding it.
“Hopefully we’ll have the same, healthy Steph for the rest of the postseason,” Klay Thompson said after the game. “You know what he does for us. It doesn’t need to be explained.”
Now there are no excuses. It’s the two best teams in the West — the two best teams in the NBA — testing each other at full strength in the conference finals we all deserve. We sure took a circuitous route to get here, but we couldn’t have asked for more.
Pelicans coach Alvin Gentry said Kerr and Rockets coach Mike D’Antoni are two of his best friends, so he refused to pick a winner, but he did say that we’re all in for a treat.
“I think it’ll very entertaining,” Gentry said. “I think the people are gonna have a great time watching that series. … I’m looking forward to it. I think it’s gonna be a great series.”
MORE ON KEVIN DURANT:
Durant was a heavily recruited high school prospect who was widely regarded as the second-best player in his class. He played one season of college basketball for the University of Texas, where he won numerous year-end awards and became the first freshman to be named Naismith College Player of the Year. In 2007, he was selected as the second overall pick by the Seattle SuperSonics in the NBA draft. After his rookie season, the team relocated to Oklahoma City and became the Thunder. Behind Durant’s leadership and his pairing with All-Star guard Russell Westbrook, the Thunder emerged as a perennial title contender, advancing as far as theNBA Finals in 2012, where they lost to the Miami Heat. He played nine seasons in Oklahoma City before signing with Golden State in 2016, winning a championship in his debut season.
Off the court, Durant often ranks as one of the highest-earning basketball players in the world, due in part to endorsement deals with companies such as Foot Locker and Nike. He has developed a reputation for his philanthropy and regularly leads the league in All-Star votes and jersey sales. In recent years, he has contributed to The Players’ Tribune as both a photographer and writer. In 2012, he tried his hand at acting, appearing in the film Thunderstruck.
MORE ON STEPHEN CURRY:
Wardell Stephen Curry II (/ˈstɛfən/ STEF-ən; born March 14, 1988) is an American professional basketballplayer for the Golden State Warriors of the National Basketball Association (NBA). Many players and analysts have called him the greatest shooter in NBA history.[1] In 2014–15, Curry won the NBA Most Valuable Player Award and led the Warriors to their first championship since 1975. The following season, he became the first player in NBA history to be elected MVP by a unanimous vote and to lead the league in scoring while shooting above 50–40–90. That same year, the Warriors broke the record for the most wins in an NBA season en route to reaching the 2016 NBA Finals, which they lost to the Cleveland Cavaliers. Curry helped the Warriors return to the NBA Finals for a third straight year in 2017, where he won his second NBA championship.
Curry is the son of former NBA player Dell Curry and older brother of current NBA player Seth Curry. He playedcollege basketball for Davidson. There, he was twice named Southern Conference Player of the Year and set the all-time scoring record for both Davidson and the Southern Conference. During his sophomore year, he also set the single-season NCAA record for three-pointers made.
During the 2012–13 season, Curry set the NBA record for three-pointers made in a regular season with 272. He surpassed that record in 2015 with 286, and again in 2016 with 402. During the 2013–14 season, he and teammate Klay Thompson were nicknamed the Splash Brothers en route to setting the NBA record for combined three-pointers in a season with 484, a record they broke the following season (525) and again in the 2015–16 season (678).
