The Warriors’ offensive onslaught as all for naught…
The Golden State Warriors must be very pleased with the way they ran their offense on Sunday night. They scored 133 points against the Dallas Mavericks, with this offensive outburst being fueled by 27 total made threes. But the game of basketball is won by scoring more points than the opponent, and the Warriors could not do that as the Mavericks put up 143 of their own in an offensive clinic led by Luka Doncic’s 45-point night on nearly 70 percent shooting from the floor.
This loss must be very disheartening for the Warriors. One would think that winning the mathematical battle courtesy of the three-point shot will be a formula for consistent success, but it simply was not enough against the Mavericks. This, according to head coach Steve Kerr, simply shows how much the game is continuing to evolve even though plenty are pointing to the three-point revolution as the reason for the downturn in the NBA’s ratings.
“We cut it to five a couple times, guys kept fighting, but they controlled the entire game on a night where we made 27 3s and didn’t turn the ball over. It’s a modern NBA, it’s a different world, it’s a different game. And 10 years ago, you see that kind of offensive stat sheet for the team, I’d say we win that game by 20, maybe 30,” Kerr said in his postgame presser, via Ohm Youngmisuk of ESPN.
It was always going to be difficult for the Warriors to win when they allowed the Mavericks to establish a rhythm from the jump; Dallas scored 46 points in the first quarter, and regaining control of the game from that point became a near-impossible task.
“We gave up 46 [points] in the first quarter, and we’re playing upstream the rest of the way. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a box score like this. We go 27-for-54 from 3, 39 assists, 10 turnovers, and it felt like we were never really in the game,” Kerr added.
Will Warriors’ trade for Dennis Schroder be enough?
The Warriors have gone 2-8 in their last 10 games, knocking them all the way down to eighth in the Western Conference standings. They have struggled to find a two-way balance during this stretch, but will their trade for Dennis Schroder restore some order?
Stephen Curry is optimistic that Schroder will provide the Warriors with some major impact moving forward thanks to his playmaking and tenacity on the defensive end. But the Dubs may need to pull off one more move to secure their place as a contending team in the loaded West.
