The Golden State Warriors (31-8) have won the top game in the Houston Rockets (27-10) with 124:114, consolidating their lead of the standings. Without Kevin Durant, the Splash Brothers could be relied on. The rockets were on eye level for a long time, but an overwhelming trio went down against their deeper opponent.
With James Harden (thigh strain) on one side and Kevin Durant (leg problems) on the other, two superstars were missing. Since the two best teams of the league were at work here, there was of course still a lot of firepower – this was already shown by the first quarter, which went to the hosts with 37:33.
Both teams played a quick ball and took many threesomes. As the dubs allowed themselves too many mistakes in some phases, the rockets seemed to be able to break away and led with 9 points just before the half time. But thanks to Klay Thompson’s two threesome Klay Thompson, among other things, the guests started a mini run in time to bring a close result (63:62 Houston) into the cabin.
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After the change of sides Gerald Green had his appearance. He first hit two difficult threesomes in a row and then added a four-point game on top of it – in the third quarter alone he scored 13 points (4/7 3FG). But the champ had no problems to keep up and shone with great registrations and correspondingly open throws. Thus it went with 90:90 into the final section.
David West had several strong scenes there and, together with Thompson, made sure that his team was suddenly in double digits, with the deepest bench of guests showing up in the closing stages, while only the trio Chris Paul/Eric Gordon/Green scored consistently with the Texans. And when Curry also interspersed important threesomes, the game was over.
Curry was his team’s top scorer with 29 points (9 rebounds, 5 assists) and Thompson (6/10 3FG) finished the evening with 28 points. Draymond Green did something of everything again and rewarded himself with a triple double (17 points, 14 rebounds, 10 assists). On the other side, Gordon hung up 30 points, Paul sniffed at the triple double (28 points, 9 assists, 7 rebounds), Gerald Green strewn in 29 points, scoring 8 of his 15 threesomes.
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The Splash Brothers. Taken together, they scored 57 points and hit 10 out of 20 threesomes – that’s how they are known. Klay also defended strongly when it came down to it, while Curry supported the front court with 9 rebounds and did a quiet job of playmaking.
Trevor Ariza. His team could have used another scoring option. Ariza couldn’t serve with that, however – he caught an off-night with 1/8 goals from the field. Especially in the final section his self-confidence was so obvious in the final section that he was ignored by the Dubs-Defense several times and left standing on the line of three.
The rockets swapped most pick-and-roll at the perimeter. Especially in the phases when “old-school players” such as Shaun Livingston or David West were on the court, the Warriors punished this by taking advantage of the resulting mismatches on the board. West, in particular, was always looking for important successes against smaller opponents.