Only the Warriors can beat the Warriors

There was a point when it looked like the Golden State Warriors might sleepwalk into one of the most embarrassing losses of the light years era. Sacramento Kings guard Buddy Hield picked off a lazy Kevin Durant pass meant for Patrick McCaw and laid it up to narrow the lead to one, 89-88. It didn’t last long.

The Warriors did what the Warriors do, promptly going on an 8-0 run taking all of 101 seconds. Against most teams, Golden State doesn’t need to play well for entire games to win. Heck, they don’t even need one good half. As long as they do enough to hang around, they just need to burp up a couple of dominate minutes here and there.

The Warriors committed 25 turnovers against the Kings, but shot 55 percent on 80 attempts. The Kings shot the ball 15 more times than the Warriors, and made a respectable 44.2 percent for the game, but still lost 119-104.

“They won tonight on talent and shooting the ball,” said head coach Steve Kerr after the game.

Through the dog days of the 82-game season, the defending champs have a tendency to play down to its competition. For the best team in the league, however, that’s usually good enough.

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“At the end of the day we’re a championship team and we know what it takes,” said Draymond Green. “There’s going to be more games where you just don’t got it but you got to find a way to win.”

They didn’t, however, find a way against the Utah Jazz the night before. The Warriors shot 45.9 percent but took six fewer shots than the Jazz, and committed 19 turnovers. It was a tough shooting night for Durant and Stephen Curry, who went a combined 9-of-26 from the field. Utah won 129-99. The Warriors have also dropped their two games since that win over the Kings — a seven-point loss to the Nuggets and a 20-point drubbing at the hands of the Thunder.

In the games Golden State has struggled this season, they’ve allowed the opposing team to dominate time of possession. The Warriors know as long as they get as many shots as their opponent, they are likely to win. That’s the benefit of having three of the best shooters to ever toe the 3-point line. However, over the last few games, the Warriors are turning the ball over at a rate that would rank worst in the league.

“When’s the All-Star break?” Kerr sarcastically asked the coterie of media after the game. “I was hoping you were gonna say tomorrow.”

“It’s painfully obvious that our guys are mentally fried,” Kerr added. “So it’s a good job to just get a win and move on.”

To blame the lack of focus and surplus of turnovers on the monotonous burger flipping that is the NBA season would be, however, avoiding the problem. Kerr hasn’t had to buff out many bad habits since inheriting the team, but turning the ball over is something he’s yet to solve.

The Warriors were one of the 10 worst teams in the league last season in turnovers per game and turnover percentage. They’ve only aggravated the problem this season. The Warriors are committing 15.8 turnovers per game, one more than last season (worse than only the Philadelphia 76ers, Los Angeles Lakers and Phoenix Suns — two lottery teams and one barely clinging to a playoff spot in the East), and have the second-worst turnover rate in the league, per NBA.com.

By last season’s playoff run the Warriors flipped the switch. In the NBA Finals, they had the same turnover rate as the Cleveland Cavaliers (11.6 percent) and took virtually the same amount of shots in the series (455 to Cleveland’s 451). That’s all they needed to outscore the Cavaliers 608 to 574 and win the series in a gentlemanly fashion. 

Cleveland isn’t a threat to take the trophy from Oakland this season, but what about the Houston Rockets? What about the San Antonio Spurs once Kawhi Leonard returns? If the stars align, Houston’s 3-point fetish could be enough to even the playing field. San Antonio may have a way to slow down the Warriors machine and grind out turnovers.

The Warriors dragging their feet into the All-Star break isn’t reason to smash the panic button. If they’re telling the truth, no one in Golden State’s locker room would say the team is giving 100 percent effort this regular season, and they still have the league’s best record.

Golden State doesn’t have many weaknesses but, if you’re a team looking to invade the throne room, their propensity for careless turnovers is the only crack that can open that door. The Warriors know it. They are well coached, and the communication from the top down is consistent: Be professional, clean up the messy play and get to the All-Star break.

“I think it directly correlates to focus,” Green said of the turnovers. “And it’s that time of year where focus is a little hard to come by.”

If you’re wondering why the Warriors sound so negative after winning by 15 points on the second night of a back to back, it’s because the standard has been set. They don’t have to worry as much about the competition as they do about themselves.

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“If we don’t build the right habits and have the right spirit going into the break, and finish out these last however many games, that could carry over.” Curry said. “And you don’t want to have that kind of negative energy around the team.”

In the finals two years ago, Golden State blew a 3-1 lead to Cleveland. They added Durant, and torched the Cavaliers in a rematch in 2017. They probably should have won in 2016 anyway, but they got in their own way.

Now there’s a new field of star clusters and wannabe competitors looking to knock them off. As they learned two seasons ago, however, the only team that can beat the Warriors is the Warriors.