Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
Missed FTs by the bucketful, comically bad crunchtime execution, off games by our two best players, one of whom was completely forgotten about on the bench in the 4th and may be strangling the coach even as I type this, and yet we still win. We win with surprising defensive hustle, by continuing to own the Warriors backcourt in remarkable fashion, and of course by IT having himself a shooting half straight out of the John Salmons vs. New Orleans handbook, dropping 7 threes on the Warriors in about 15 minutes as we got control of the game and hung on. Hopefully Vivek doesn't hold it against us and withdraw his bid.
Highlights:
Two Legged Grading Consortium for tonight:
Bricklayer
Capt. Factorial
Boxscore
Stats: 32min 9pts (3-9, 1-3, 2-3) 6reb 5ast 0stl 0blk 0TO
Salmons ( B ) -- Salmons started the game with a four-point play, and it turned out that he put out 45% of his scoring output in the first 20 seconds of the contest. He managed five assists, but still had a pretty non-descript night on offense. Salmons is more valuable to us on defense, though, and tonight that's where he did his best work. He allowed only 2 points tonight on 8 shots - and perhaps the more remarkable thing is that he played good enough off-ball defense that his charges only got off 8 shots on the night. This came despite the fact that he was often forced to cover ground he shouldn't have to - in the late third he bothered Jarrett Jack into two missed threes where he was forced to cover both the corner shooter and the man at the high elbow (25 feet apart) because MT23 decided he had to triple-team in the paint. Salmons didn't play down the stretch, with Smart opting to put Tyreke at the 3 and Douglas on Curry, but he had a pretty nice contribution tonight anyway. --Capt.
Stats: 23min 9pts (4-10, 0-0, 1-2) 9reb 1ast 1stl 1blk 1TO
Thompson ( B- ) -- started the game off in such ridiculously hot fashion that a mere 9pt 9reb night is a sincere disappointment. Had 8 of his 9 points within the first 5 minutes of the game as we came out with a gameplan that really exposed how the worm has turned for Andrew Bogut. Bogut, whom I always thought had gotten vastly overrated at one point but nonetheless carried the big defensive reputation with him, actually became our target, as we repeatedly went right at him with JT, or at least JT's jumper, and scored on three straight trips with that. But the Warriors called a timeout...and did not seem to change anything themselves, they just let our coach/brilliant team think it over during the timeout and decide to never go back to it again. And so JT faded into the background rarely to be heard from again with Patterson and Hayes both making nice contributiuons themselves. One nice thing to see was that JT had several very strong/aggressive rebounds this game. For whatever reason his boardwork has fallen off this year, and its precisely that sort of aggression moving toward the ball and snatching it which has too often been lacking. Tonight he had it and was effective on the glass. --Brick
Stats: 23min 14pts (7-15, 0-0, 0-4) 6reb 0ast 2stl 0blk 5TO
Cousins ( C- ) -- just did not look comfortable out there as the Warriors somehow did their mojo thing on him again. He had a couple of spectacular dunks on the move off of nice passes from his guards, but for the most part stuggled to finish inside as he reverted to his off balance, falling down, low percentage throw it at the hoop and pray stuff, and looked intimidated by Bogut in there. Even missed 4 straight FTs. More oddly he had a series of seriously unforced turnovers whihc looked like either he or the intended passing targets, who were not always obvious, were runnign entirely different plays. These were miss you by 5 feet sort of passes, like he expected somebody to have moved to a certain spot, they did not, and he threw it anyway. Despite seemingly being out of rhythm, was working his way into decent productivity when a series of mistakes, and especially fouls, prematurely ended his night in the third. Got himself into foul trouble, and then somewhat dubiously ended up over on the bench watching the entire rest of the game. Still finished as our second leading scorer in only half a game, but he really wasn't going well so much as just very involved during his minutes, for better or worse. --Brick
Stats: 34min 12pts (4-12, 1-4, 3-4) 3reb 5ast 1stl 0blk 1TO
Evans ( C+ ) -- Tyreke came in with an off night after dealing with a stomach issue that took him out of the game on Sunday night. There was a suggestion that he might not have his legs under him , and he was definitely having trouble on his layups, missing three of his first four. He only drove to the basket once in the entire second half, getting blocked by Bogut on that play. With his drive not working (and his jumper only OK) on the offensive end he focused more on moving the ball. He had one of the best passes of the game, sneaking it through a double-team to an open Cuz in the lane for a dunk, and Tyreke finished with 5 assists on 12 setup shots. He had a few good defensive plays, including a backcourt steal from David Lee, but had his own share of lapses on the defensive end, once going for a steal and taking himself out of the play and tending strongly to slump off of his man. Fortunately for 'Reke, Klay Thompson had such a terrible night that those mistakes didn't hurt us, and the Warriors scored 14 points on 15 shots against him, which is pretty good. In the end, I don't think 12 points on 4-12 shooting is a C+ game for Tyreke, but given that he was sick, and given his ball distribution tonight, I'm giving him a bit of a pass. --Capt.
Stats: 35min 31pts (10-18, 7-12, 4-6) 3reb 7ast 1stl 0blk 3TO
Thomas ( A ) -- IT led off the game with assists on the first four Kings baskets and set up the first five shots overall. That rate went down precipitously after the game opened, with Thomas setting up only four more shots the rest of the half, and notably failing to develop a shot for the team in the final 16 seconds before the buzzer. In the third, he only set up two shots and in the fourth he didn't set any up, but if you watched the game you know there's kind of a reason for that. In the second half, IT scored 25 of his 31 points, including 17 in the third quarter on 5-6 from deep. Did he get a bit shot-happy in the late third and early fourth? Yeah, he did. It included a desperation three-point shot fighting a double team and the clock, and a missed hero-ball layup immediately after he came off the bench from his rest in the fourth. But despite that, his scoring was brilliant - 31 points on 21 shots gets it done. Defensively, we know what IT is going to give us, and as expected he wasn't really up to the task of staying in front of Curry. Still, Curry had a terrible game just like Klay Thompson, going 1-9 in the first half and finishing the game at 5-18 from the floor. IT himself only allowed 7 points on 11 shots if you ignore some of the late-game "alternate defensive strategy" which is really a coaching thing so it's hard to fault the players for it. However, Curry did have 12 assists on the night and a lot of those setups were done after getting around IT on a screen or a drive. But whatever his defensive deficiencies, IT's passing gave us a good lead (that we squandered) early and his shooting in the second half won us this game, so the D gets a pass. --Capt.
Highlights:
Two Legged Grading Consortium for tonight:
Bricklayer
Capt. Factorial
Boxscore
Stats: 32min 9pts (3-9, 1-3, 2-3) 6reb 5ast 0stl 0blk 0TO
Salmons ( B ) -- Salmons started the game with a four-point play, and it turned out that he put out 45% of his scoring output in the first 20 seconds of the contest. He managed five assists, but still had a pretty non-descript night on offense. Salmons is more valuable to us on defense, though, and tonight that's where he did his best work. He allowed only 2 points tonight on 8 shots - and perhaps the more remarkable thing is that he played good enough off-ball defense that his charges only got off 8 shots on the night. This came despite the fact that he was often forced to cover ground he shouldn't have to - in the late third he bothered Jarrett Jack into two missed threes where he was forced to cover both the corner shooter and the man at the high elbow (25 feet apart) because MT23 decided he had to triple-team in the paint. Salmons didn't play down the stretch, with Smart opting to put Tyreke at the 3 and Douglas on Curry, but he had a pretty nice contribution tonight anyway. --Capt.
Stats: 23min 9pts (4-10, 0-0, 1-2) 9reb 1ast 1stl 1blk 1TO
Thompson ( B- ) -- started the game off in such ridiculously hot fashion that a mere 9pt 9reb night is a sincere disappointment. Had 8 of his 9 points within the first 5 minutes of the game as we came out with a gameplan that really exposed how the worm has turned for Andrew Bogut. Bogut, whom I always thought had gotten vastly overrated at one point but nonetheless carried the big defensive reputation with him, actually became our target, as we repeatedly went right at him with JT, or at least JT's jumper, and scored on three straight trips with that. But the Warriors called a timeout...and did not seem to change anything themselves, they just let our coach/brilliant team think it over during the timeout and decide to never go back to it again. And so JT faded into the background rarely to be heard from again with Patterson and Hayes both making nice contributiuons themselves. One nice thing to see was that JT had several very strong/aggressive rebounds this game. For whatever reason his boardwork has fallen off this year, and its precisely that sort of aggression moving toward the ball and snatching it which has too often been lacking. Tonight he had it and was effective on the glass. --Brick
Stats: 23min 14pts (7-15, 0-0, 0-4) 6reb 0ast 2stl 0blk 5TO
Cousins ( C- ) -- just did not look comfortable out there as the Warriors somehow did their mojo thing on him again. He had a couple of spectacular dunks on the move off of nice passes from his guards, but for the most part stuggled to finish inside as he reverted to his off balance, falling down, low percentage throw it at the hoop and pray stuff, and looked intimidated by Bogut in there. Even missed 4 straight FTs. More oddly he had a series of seriously unforced turnovers whihc looked like either he or the intended passing targets, who were not always obvious, were runnign entirely different plays. These were miss you by 5 feet sort of passes, like he expected somebody to have moved to a certain spot, they did not, and he threw it anyway. Despite seemingly being out of rhythm, was working his way into decent productivity when a series of mistakes, and especially fouls, prematurely ended his night in the third. Got himself into foul trouble, and then somewhat dubiously ended up over on the bench watching the entire rest of the game. Still finished as our second leading scorer in only half a game, but he really wasn't going well so much as just very involved during his minutes, for better or worse. --Brick
Stats: 34min 12pts (4-12, 1-4, 3-4) 3reb 5ast 1stl 0blk 1TO
Evans ( C+ ) -- Tyreke came in with an off night after dealing with a stomach issue that took him out of the game on Sunday night. There was a suggestion that he might not have his legs under him , and he was definitely having trouble on his layups, missing three of his first four. He only drove to the basket once in the entire second half, getting blocked by Bogut on that play. With his drive not working (and his jumper only OK) on the offensive end he focused more on moving the ball. He had one of the best passes of the game, sneaking it through a double-team to an open Cuz in the lane for a dunk, and Tyreke finished with 5 assists on 12 setup shots. He had a few good defensive plays, including a backcourt steal from David Lee, but had his own share of lapses on the defensive end, once going for a steal and taking himself out of the play and tending strongly to slump off of his man. Fortunately for 'Reke, Klay Thompson had such a terrible night that those mistakes didn't hurt us, and the Warriors scored 14 points on 15 shots against him, which is pretty good. In the end, I don't think 12 points on 4-12 shooting is a C+ game for Tyreke, but given that he was sick, and given his ball distribution tonight, I'm giving him a bit of a pass. --Capt.
Stats: 35min 31pts (10-18, 7-12, 4-6) 3reb 7ast 1stl 0blk 3TO
Thomas ( A ) -- IT led off the game with assists on the first four Kings baskets and set up the first five shots overall. That rate went down precipitously after the game opened, with Thomas setting up only four more shots the rest of the half, and notably failing to develop a shot for the team in the final 16 seconds before the buzzer. In the third, he only set up two shots and in the fourth he didn't set any up, but if you watched the game you know there's kind of a reason for that. In the second half, IT scored 25 of his 31 points, including 17 in the third quarter on 5-6 from deep. Did he get a bit shot-happy in the late third and early fourth? Yeah, he did. It included a desperation three-point shot fighting a double team and the clock, and a missed hero-ball layup immediately after he came off the bench from his rest in the fourth. But despite that, his scoring was brilliant - 31 points on 21 shots gets it done. Defensively, we know what IT is going to give us, and as expected he wasn't really up to the task of staying in front of Curry. Still, Curry had a terrible game just like Klay Thompson, going 1-9 in the first half and finishing the game at 5-18 from the floor. IT himself only allowed 7 points on 11 shots if you ignore some of the late-game "alternate defensive strategy" which is really a coaching thing so it's hard to fault the players for it. However, Curry did have 12 assists on the night and a lot of those setups were done after getting around IT on a screen or a drive. But whatever his defensive deficiencies, IT's passing gave us a good lead (that we squandered) early and his shooting in the second half won us this game, so the D gets a pass. --Capt.
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