THE PALACE OF AUBURN HILLS, AUBURN HILLS, MI — One night after defeating the Nets, the Golden State Warriors (26-4) went to the Motor City to face the Detroit Pistons (14-17).
The Warriors welcomed back Draymond Green, who flew back to Michigan after tending to the birth of his son, and were without Damian Jones (D-League assignment).
The Pistons were without Reggie Bullock (left knee surgery).
Q1: Ebb & Flow
The Warriors got off to a nice start as Klay Thompson toilet-bowled a triple from the right wing assisted by Stephen Curry, Zaza Pachulia scored inside on another feed by Curry, getting a goal-tend call, and Thompson hit another three, followed by a swish from the left arc by Kevin Durant.
Pistons head coach Stan Van Gundy took an early timeout as the Warriors moved ahead, 11-4.
But Golden State lost its momentum out of the timeout as Klay turned the ball over, which led to a fast break alley-oop from Marcus Morris to Kentavious Caldwell-Pope.
After a Warriors miss, Pope hit a three in transition, although Thompson answered back with a triple from the top.
But Andre Drummond got an alley-oop from Pope, Durant smoked a layup down the right side, and Morris found Jon Leuer inside for a bucket, and Golden State head coach Steve Kerr called timeout as the Pistons evened the score, 13-13, with 7:58 remaining.
Curry scored off a Pachulia pick out of the timeout on a catch curling the elbow, “KD” hit a three, then got an and-one on a nice dribble-and-pop towards the right baseline. Durant, however, once again missed the free throw.
Later, Green made a great close-out on a Pope triple, Durant boarded, found Green in transition, who lobbed to JaVale McGee for a slam dunk:
[protected-iframe id=”f3a3a4ad67b1738718e671f51f509ef3-114320562-10106876″ info=”http://twitframe.com/show?url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2Fwarriors%2Fstatus%2F812463016239210496″ width=”550″ height=”250″ frameborder=”0″]Van Gundy picked up a technical in the process and the free throw by Curry put the Warriors up, 23-16.
But Detroit went on a mini-run as Reggie Jackson swished a pull-up, Steph kicked the ball on a dribble, Morris hit a catch-and-shoot, and the referees missed a hack by Drummond on a McGee slam attempt fed by Andre Iguodala.
Instead, Leuer scored a layup from Drummond at the other end, Curry made a bad pass that Leuer stole and went the length of the court for a layup.
Kerr called timeout as the Pistons went ahead, 24-23.
Out of the timeout, JaVale got a dunk fed by Draymond…
[protected-iframe id=”2582fcf9a2cd3de3d6c0137dc3fb7a77-114320562-10106876″ info=”http://twitframe.com/show?url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2Fwarriors%2Fstatus%2F812464320403492864″ width=”550″ height=”250″ frameborder=”0″]…but Ish Smith came in and kept the Warriors on their heels, getting an and-one layup, then a burst into the lane for a floater, and an assist to Aron Baynes inside.
Steph countered by drawing three foul shots on up-fakes against Pope, then with a crossover step-back in the left corner over Leuer…
[protected-iframe id=”fa453e4eff3dfc14ed6c3d468714f63a-114320562-10106876″ info=”https://vine.co/v/50DwBp2xQlw/embed/simple” width=”300″ height=”300″ frameborder=”0″]https://platform.vine.co/static/scripts/embed.js…but Durant missed a pull-up at the buzzer and the Warriors held a slim 33-32 lead into the second stanza.
Q2: Punch/Counter-punch
David West got a dunk from Durant to start the second frame, but Smith answered with a layup.
Later, after a Tobias Harris miss, KD went coast-to-coast with a lefty finish, Klay added a lefty finish, and Van Gundy took another timeout as Golden State edged out to a 41-39 lead.
A few sequences later, Ian Clark forced and won a jump ball against some good defense by Morris, a questionable call by the ref. After that, Clark hit a couple free throws, Tobias Harris missed a jumper, and Durant went coast to coast for these huge steps that Curry emulated on the bench in celebration:
[protected-iframe id=”49b63d54bc22b87ea5909c73f06e79e3-114320562-10106876″ info=”https://vine.co/v/50DIXZBrxOe/embed/simple” width=”300″ height=”300″ frameborder=”0″]https://platform.vine.co/static/scripts/embed.jsVan Gundy called another timeout to stem the tide with 7:05, Leuer got a jump hook, Pachulia set a bad pick, Harris hit a triple, Steph missed, and Jackson scored in transition.
Curry later missed a lefty down the lane, then Leuer fed Drummond down low and he got fouled while dunking, prompting Kerr to called timeout as the Pistons moved ahead, 52-48, with 3:46 to go.
Steph then inexplicably took too long on a series of crossovers, resulting in a shot clock violation as he finally attacked the lane, but Curry atoned with a three on a catch-and-shoot.
The Pistons, however, kept punching back as Pope hit a triple, Jackson got a bucket, iguodala scored over Baynes on a drive, but Harris answered again with a jumper.
With 9 seconds left, Jackson missed, then Klay got hit on a baseline jumper with 2 seconds remaining.
His free throws closed the gap to a 59-57 defecit at halftime for the Warriors.
The Dubs’ Big Three combined for 40 points, but the team committed 11 turnovers with Curry guilty on 3 of them. Pope had 13 points for Detroit and Drummond added 10.
(Photo: @letsgowarriors Instagram account via @shakelife_ego)
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
