ORACLE ARENA, OAKLAND, CA — One night after defeating the Lakers in Los Angeles, the Golden State Warriors (14-2) were back at home to face the Minnesota Timberwolves (5-10).
The Warriors were without Draymond Green (ankle contusion) and Ian Clark (throat), both injured last night. Damian Jones was on assignment with D-League affiliate Santa Cruz.
Golden State head coach Steve Kerr elected to start Kevon Looney in place of Green, and revealed that Looney would defend Minnesota’s prodigy Karl-Anthony Towns from the get-go.
The Timberwolves were without Nikola Pekovic (ankle).
Q1:
The Warriors and Timberwolves got off to strong starts, as Andrew Wiggins hit two jumpers over Klay Thompson, but Klay made two as well, one of them a triple off a curl.
Golden State, however, hit another gear as Kevin Durant took a rebound the length of the court and side-stepped the retreating defense for a layup, Curry hit a triple in transition after Thompson stole the ball on a bad pass by Zach LaVine, and after a Wiggins miss, Steph hit Durant for a touchdown layup.
That put the Warriors up, 12-4, with 9:22 remaining as Timberwolves head coach Tom Thibodeau called a timeout.
Minnesota kept the game within reach with a righty baseline hook by Towns, a LaVine triple and another jumper, and a dribble-and-pop from Towns, letting Looney fly by.
But Golden State countered with a Curry stop-and-pop assisted by Durant, a nasty in-and-out lefty dribble by KD that led to a pull-up, and with 6:06 to play, the Warriors still held an eight-point lead, 21-13.
The Warriors got sloppy, though, as Zaza Pachulia made a weak move and got swatted by Gorgui Dieng, the sequence ending with a LaVine run-out layup.
Another bad pass later led to another LaVine breakaway layup, and Kerr called timeout as Minnesota evened the score, 22-22, with 3:38 to go.
Out of the timeout, Steph got a floater, then a running banker, but Towns scored inside…
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…then posted up and fed Wiggins back outside for three.
Curry got a near steal, but Dieng ended up with the loose ball and slammed down the lane.
Andre Iguodala also got a near steal on a deflection, but the Warriors once again got punished, as Towns got control and manhandled Iguodala down low for the bucket, and one.
That gave the Timberwolves a 31-28 lead before Curry managed to turn a trap in the right corner into a scoop down the baseline, getting past Cole Aldrich and Ricky Rubio in the process, with under a minute left.
But Towns went strong again, this time against Anderson Varejao and the helping David West, Varejao got an inside bucket after Steph nicely split the double up top, and Rubio missed at the horn, giving the Wolves a 33-30 lead heading into the second stanza.
Q2: Chef’s Defense, KD’s Dagger
Short-handed, Kerr started Shaun Livingston, Patrick McCaw, Durant, Iguodala, and West to start the second quarter.
Durant made a nice play on a LaVine three…
KD says nope ✋ #SlateNight pic.twitter.com/25EEKxF2Us
— GoldenStateWarriors (@warriors) November 27, 2016
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…while Livingston made a nifty lefty behind-the-back post-up pass to West, but West got fouled.
Zach right pivot 3 short, kd pull short, bjel bad xcourt pass, kd and one 32-36 7:41 33-36 kd putback sdot
Shab air kd, kd upfake contact vs gd scoop tt timeout 35-36 7:06
Timberwolves forward Nemanja Bjelica threw the ball away twice, but did drill two three on the catch, and while Durant had trouble hitting a bucket, going 3-for-8 overall, at the TV timeout, Minnesota held a 36-30 lead with 8:39 remaining.
After Bjelica’s second bad pass, Livingston back-rimmed a pull-up turnaround jumper, but Durant muscled the rebound, although he may have gotten a way with a little push, then drew enough contact on the putback to earn a trip to the line.
KD then grabbed an airball by Shabazz Muhammad and attacked the paint on another upfake, throwing his body into Dieng for more contact, but no whistle this time.
That prompted Thibodeau to take a timeout as the Wolves’ lead was at 36-35 with 7:06 remaining.
Curry’s defense sparked the Warriors offense, as LaVine lost the ball and Steph found Pachulia inside. Zaza then fed Looney at the rim, assisted to Klay on a slip of a fake screen, but Looney and Curry committed turnovers and the game stayed tight.
After Iguodala bricked a triple, Kerr brought in JaVale McGee to cheers, in for Pachulia.
McGee got a bucket inside, but then got called for a push off running from defense to offense. JaVale told the ref that he was duped into the foul, that the Minnesota defender was moving during the process.
But Towns couldn’t hit, as Durant played good close-out defense on the post-up fade, McGee rebounded, dropped the ball off for Steph, Curry ran the floor, put on the brakes as if to shoot a three from the top, and left a bounce pass for JaVale behind him, but he recovered and slammed home the two points.
Steph was at it again, stealing the ball from Rubio, but his left hand inadvertently hit Rubio in the face on the change of possession, and the ref called Curry for his third personal foul, prompting Kerr to sub him out.
LaVine and Livingston traded buckets, then KD sent the Warriors into the locker room on a tidal wave, getting another finesse putback on misses from distances by both himself and Klay, then after Wiggins missed a left-corner three, Kerr called timeout to set up something.
Curry was brought in as the primary ball-handler, probed the top and dished back out to Durant, who made a massive crossover of Rubio on the deep right wing and swished the trey at the buzzer:
Kevin Durant beats the buzzer with a three after Rubio blew up the play, Steph celebrates with Mannequin Challenge pic.twitter.com/uEapbLJXtF
— CJ Fogler (@cjzero) November 27, 2016
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The Warriors took a 56-48 lead into halftime.
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