SLEEP TRAIN ARENA, SACRAMENTO, CA — The Golden State Warriors took a bus trip this morning up to “Cowbell Kingdom” to face the Sacramento Kings
Andrew Bogut was out again with a concussion. DeMarcus Cousins was out with an Achilles strain. Seth Curry was questionable with a sprained right ankle.
1st Quarter – Warriors Eradicate “Trapgameitis” With Defense
“Trapgameitis” is what CSN Bay Area Monte Poole likes to call it and that’s what the Warriors looked like they had in a lethargic first quarter.
Festus Ezeli got out to a great start again with a dunk via Harrison Barnes cut into the paint, but Rudy Gay hit a three, and Rajon Rondo and Kosta Koufos hit buckets as the Kings took an early 7-2 lead.
Out of a baseline out-of-bounds, Barnes mishandled Curry’s feed but managed to recollect and dunk the ball, but for the next 8 minutes, Golden State would combine to go just 2-for-13 from the field before Draymond Green stole the ball from Marco Belinelli and went the length of the court to feed Ezeli at the last moment for a layup.
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Power forward Jason Thompson, who played 7 years with the Kings, got an early sub-in at the 3:44 mark to a nice applause from the Sacramento crowd and, after a nice Curry layup, got an offensive rebound putback of a missed Steph trey.
Iguodala added a three-pointer, but the Warriors defense started to create some separation in the game. Even early on, Golden State was moving its feet and forcing Sacramento to shoot late in the shot clock.
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Iguodala got a steal on Belinelli and went with a lefty bounce pass from the right side on the fast break as Livingston laid the ball in.
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After another missed Curry triple, Livingston stole the ball yet again from Belinelli and that led to a fastbreak dunk by Iguodala.
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The Warriors took a 20-14 lead into the second frame. Ezeli and Iguodala led the scoring with 5 apiece.
2nd Quarter – Curry Can’t Get Going As Gay Does
Golden State forced 4 early turnovers that led to a Barnes dunk, assisted by Leandro Barbosa, an Iguodala fastbreak layup, and a Barbosa fastbreak layup punctuated by a behind-the-back bounce pass assist from Iguodala.
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That put the Warriors up 30-19 with 7:17 remaining, forcing Kings head coach George Karl to call timeout to stop the bleeding.
Meanwhile, Curry checked back in and so did the rest of the starters, but with Iguodala instead of Barnes, after that.
Ezeli got an and-one on a nice post play drawing a lot of contact in the right block and going with the bank shot over Koufos.
Klay got a catch-and-shoot swish from the right corner to drop after three misses from downtown, assisted by a jump pass from Green attacking the paint, but the Kings answered with one-on-one play by Gay, one of them an and-one scored against Green.
But Klay corralled a Gay three-point miss and outlet to Barbosa, who saw Draymond near the Warriors’ baseline and did a jump-flip pass to get him a reverse layup, then Thompson got three catch-and-shoots to drop.
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The last two shots by Klay were three-pointers and that gave Golden State a 45-32 lead with 59.9 seconds remaining.
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Belinelli hit a three, Curry missed the front end of penalty free throws, and Belinelli made all three free throws after getting fouled with 4.4 seconds remaining by Klay from beyond the arc.
Barnes missed a three from the corner at the halftime buzzer as two Kings converged on ballhandler Curry, who finished the half with just 3 points on 1-for-6 floor, 0-for-4 downtown.
Iguodala led the Warriors with 9 points, with Festus adding 6 rebounds, while Iguodala, Green, and Barbosa had 3 assists each. Gay led the Kings with 14 points.
(Photo: @letsgowarriors Instagram account via @mikeyfernz)
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