Well, the Warrior are four down again in the loss column (25 - 29) to getting to the magical .500 mark. Sound familiar? We were that in January when we had those tough losses to the Clips and Bobs. The Jazz and Deron Williams will be motivated to show they can win without former coach Jerry Sloan and to avenge their loss to the Warriors last time. It should be a tough time out.
Warriors with a gritty, defensive win over Utah. Everyone played well. Even Curry, who had foul trouble, and only 1 made basket, had a crucial revers layup in crunch time to preserve the lead. But really, it was Monta Ellis, who single handedly destroyed the Utah Jazz. Just utterly and totally dominated their entire team for the whole game. I'm pretty much speechless.
That was an all-star performance by Monta last night. Not only that, they looked like a real basketball team for the first time all season. I wish the all-star break was pushed out a week
I give huge cheers to Monta for his performance last night, big baskets with the clock winding down on the road. He's one of the best all around shooters in the league, he puts up more 13-22 games than anyone. However, his defense is still awful but against a team like Utah without a big scoring guard, not a big deal. Huge cheers also for Lin and BWright for coming up big in the 2nd quarter. I almost lost it in the 4th though, I thought that Smart almost single-handedly lost the game by GOING SMALL!!!! I hate that. He had Vlad and Dorell at the 4 and 5 and the Warriors got pounded by Jefferson and Millsap on the defensive glass. It was like playground hoops in 2nd grade where the tallest guys got every rebound because you couldn't even reach the ball. What is Smart thinking? Was he doing a Nellie imitation? Why? I hope Lacob reams out Smart on that strategy and tells him never, ever, get pounded like that again or he's fired. Nice closing by the Warriors, Monta with huge buckets and Curry with the sweet reverse (Cheers also go out to Reggie with a big game off the bench.)
Reggie Williams had a great game too. I think Smart is starting to understand substitution patterns now. He rested the starters appropriately on a b2b game on the road. I thought he played Curry appropriately given his poor shooting night. He maximized his contributions. Side note, I think Gordan Hayward may be the next Mike Dunleavy Jr. as far as posterization shots. I know he didn't get dunked on last night, but he got manhandled by everyone guarding him and whoever he was guarding, mostly Monta.
I actually think Hayward is going to be very solid for Utah in the next few years. He already looks a lot stronger and more athletic than DunDun coming in. And, BTW, he had his own posterization last night. He stole David Lee's pass, went the length of the court, and then dunked on David Lee's head as Lee tried to block it. I had to rewind it. I was like "damn." Dunny boy would've never done that. In fact, lol, I wish Dorell Wright would take a page out of Hayward's book on that play. * edit, okay that second picture is looking very Dunnish lol... don't make me do it... okay, you started it:
I just saw bits and pieces and the ending of the Jazz game. That was a bit like playoff basketball. The Warriors were forced to slow the game down. It was a good thing they were able to take it to the hoop on the Jazz. That seemed to be the difference in crunch time. I definitely would not trade Monta and glad we got David Lee. Noticeably absent was Andris Biedrins in crunch time, but that's typical (actually AB played a good game for the time he was in). I didn't like the small lineup in the 4Q, but it worked against the Jazz. A good rotation by Keith Smart for once.
