The Portland Trail Blazers took down the Golden State Warriors 127-123 at the Chase Center in the NBA Cup on Friday. This was a third straight loss for the Warriors, and Stephen Curry was asked postgame what was most disappointing about this latest defeat.
“Feel like we played well enough to win, but have nothing to show for it,” Curry said, via 95.7 The Game. “Just some untimely defensive breakdowns led to some open threes down the stretch. Early in the game it was we couldn’t get a rebound. Just defensively together as a unit, didn’t do good enough to give ourselves a chance down the stretch.”
Rebounding was definitely a big reason why the Warriors came up short here. The Trail Blazers outrebounded them 52-32 on the night. The visitors had 21 offensive rebounds, and it’s hard to win when you keep giving a team extra possessions.
The Trail Blazers would end up hitting the 30-point mark in three of the four quarters. They had 33 points in the fourth, and Caleb Love scored 11 of those. Love was left open on multiple occasions down the stretch, and he made the hosts pay.
As for the offensive end, Curry had 38 points (14-23 FG), two rebounds, and four assists on the night. Like Love, he too had 11 points in the fourth but missed two threes in the dying moments of the game that could have made things interesting.
While Curry still impressed in the quarter, his co-star Jimmy Butler did not. Butler, who has been very efficient this season, went 1-5 from the field in the period and finished the night with 20 points (5-15 FG), eight rebounds, five assists, two steals, and one block.
With this latest loss, the Warriors have dropped to 9-9 in the season and 1-2 in the cup. They are at the bottom of West Group C and look set to exit the competition in the group stage.
Steve Kerr Admits Warriors Might Have To Play Two Bigs
The Warriors have had a lot of success over the years playing smaller lineups, but head coach Steve Kerr thinks they might have to go away from that a bit now. Kerr admitted postgame that they will have to consider having another big man with Draymond Green more often during games.
“We may have to play two bigs more often,” Kerr said, via Anthony Slater. “Al [Horford], [Quinten Post], or Trayce [Jackson-Davis] with Draymond. We’ll have to look at that.”
The Warriors started Curry, Will Richard, Butler, Moses Moody, and Green against the Trail Blazers. Brandin Podziemski played 30 minutes off the bench as well, as Kerr opted to go with four guards for long stretches in this game.
That helped Donovan Clingan and Toumari Camara both grab five offensive rebounds on the night. A 6’8″ forward like Camara getting that many isn’t ideal, and the Warriors might well be forced to change their approach moving forward.
Al Horford and Quinten Post played 18 and 17 minutes, respectively, against the Trail Blazers and grabbed 10 rebounds between them. Horford could have potentially played more, but exited the game before the fourth quarter due to right hamstring tightness. The veteran is considered day-to-day, and the Warriors would be hoping he doesn’t miss too much time.
The Warriors are in action next against the Utah Jazz at Chase Center on Monday at 10 PM ET. Alarm bells haven’t started ringing just yet, but if they lose to the 5-10 Jazz, then it might be time to start getting worried.
