If these Kings were going to do one thing right, in other words, it was to avoid making this already brutal challenge even harder. And really, it made a whole lot of sense considering the way those Memphis Grizzlies had both irritated and inspired the Warriors with their incessant trash talking when they fell to them in the second round a year ago. UGbPCOxx7VĪs such, everyone not named Draymond Green (the foot stomp of Domantas Sabonis’ chest in Game 2 and subsequent crowd riling) and Malik Monk (essentially calling the Warriors old after Game 6) seemed to take the anti-Dillon Brooks approach to this matchup - i.e. Then just about everyone found Mike Brown. Lot of mutual respect between organizations. Here is a look at the post-series embraces between the Warriors and Kings. That list was long, and you could see all the affection between both teams when the competition came to an end. Kings forward Harrison Barnes and his complicated past with this Warriors group. You had Kings coach Mike Brown and the six seasons of Warriors notes he’d taken as Steve Kerr’s right-hand man before taking this job. It wasn’t just the geographical component that made the matchup unique, though, but also the seemingly endless personal ties between the two sides that made for a more sensitive personal dynamic. It ended in a similar form - save for the absence of the beam this time - with the Warriors closing it out with all that unwelcome force. The Kings’ woeful history created a swell of emotion when Game 1 finally arrived, with this success-starved fan base letting 17 years’ worth of postseason-less angst out on that eardrum-eviscerating, Saturday afternoon affair. Instead, the defending champs move on to face the Lakers in the West semifinals and Sacramento heads into the summer with its own confidence that this is the start of something special.īut this first-ever Northern California postseason faceoff was a series for the ages, even for the Warriors group that had been through so many before (it’s 28 series and counting with this core). These upstart Kings came so close to forcing the Warriors to have the “Last Dance” discussion, to wonder whether all that luxury tax would be worth it if they couldn’t even survive until the second round. In the end, it was that sort of moxie from the players themselves - no one more so than Steph Curry and his 50-piece performance - that propelled them past this Kings team in the 120-100 win. Pre-game swagger from an owner is hardly the type of stuff that moves the line in Vegas, but his perspective did speak volumes about these Warriors and the confidence that comes with dominating for most of a decade. ![]() ![]() “If we lose?” he said while repeating my question and looking at me as if I had three heads. Yet as Lacob and I chatted on the baseline before the series finale, he shared his uncensored truth when faced with the unwelcome reality that a Golden State loss would bring all those fork-in-the-road questions to the fore.
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