Getty Kristaps Porzingis and Monte Morris of the Washington Wizards and Klay Thompson of the Golden State Warriors.
It’s been an extremely up-and-down season for the Golden State Warriors, who haven’t been able to improve their place in the standings for the majority of the year. As of now, they currently sit at 29-28, which is good for ninth place in the Western Conference standings.
They picked up a win on February 13 over the Washington Wizards. With Steph Curry sidelined, other players have been stepping up, and against Washington, those players were Andrew Wiggins and Klay Thompson. After the game, Wizards head coach Wes Unseld Jr. sent a message on Thompson.
“There were some good moments where we lost him in transition,” Unseld said via NBC Sports Bay Area. “He’s going to create a lot of separation and we have to have the discipline to minimize all the separation, to be a step ahead of the play. He’s at his most dangerous when he doesn’t have the ball, when he’s just moving and cutting.”
Obviously, Thompson has cemented himself as one of the greatest shooters of all time. However, after his two season-ending injuries, this is the first full season he’s played since returning. It took him a while to get back up to full speed, but he’s been starting to return to form.
Against the Wizards, he was second on the Warriors in the scoring column, behind only Wiggins. Thompson ended the night with 27 points, four rebounds, and five assists on 10-of-21 shooting from the floor and 4-of-13 shooting from behind the three-point line.
As for Wiggins, the Warriors star dropped a team-high 29 points to go along with seven rebounds and four assists. He shot 12-of-22 from the field and 3-of-6 from behind the arc.
Draymond Green Warns Jordan Poole
With Curry out, the Warriors need all hands on deck if they want to improve their playoff positioning. That includes Jordan Poole, who picked up his 10th technical foul of the season on February 11 against the Los Angeles Lakers. After the game, Warriors star Draymond Green, who has plenty of experience picking up techs, issued Poole a warning.
“I don’t want him to walk the line,” Green said via the LetsGoWarriors YouTube channel. “I think I’ve spoke about that before. It’s not really one you wanna walk. It’s a battle you can’t win. But every man is gonna speak for themselves when they feel the need to speak, and I support everybody having their voice if you wanna use it. … It is what it is. He gotta make sure he don’t get to 16 [technicals].”
Bob Myers Discusses Warriors Buyout Market Plans
As for the team’s plans to improve the roster further, Warriors GM Bob Myers revealed that the Warriors will look at potential options on the buyout market and see if there is anyone they think can help them this season.
“Yeah, we’ll have to look at the buyout market,” Myers said via the NBC Sports Bay Area & California YouTube Channel. “I think much like last year’s deadline, we moved forward with Looney and Draymond, who have kind of split minutes in the regular season. JaMychal, I guess is who you can call our other big. Last year, we also had a couple of non-traditional bigs. Nemanja Bjelica’s not in the NBA, so I can talk about him. He was a shooting big who did a nice job and was another good player that helped us. We hope that we have enough, but we’ll look and see.”
