The Golden State Warriors didn’t replace Kevin Durant when he missed Game 2 against the Portland Trail Blazers on Wednesday. They didn’t need to. Instead of assigning him impact to a player, they chopped it up, passed it around and ended up with a dominant 30-point win without a single player even scoring 20 points.
The Warriors’ Kevin Durant replacement in Game 2 was a total team effort
No one player can replace KD, so they all did collectively.
Durant isn’t gone long — he could have played, but is sitting on the side of caution with a strained left calf. Of course, Durant was out for more than a month during the regular season, only returning with three games left on the schedule. To make certain he’s healthy, Golden State doesn’t need to risk playing him in the first round that they believed they could win handily without him. As it turned out, they could.
The high scorer in the 110-81 win was Stephen Curry, who scored 19 points on mediocre shooting — 6-of-18 from the field — but was a team best plus-32 during his time on the court. Other contributions came from all other: Klay Thompson with 16; JaVale McGee with 15 on 7-of-7 shooting; Andre Iguodala with six, but 10 rebounds and six assists; Draymond Green with six points, 12 rebounds, 10 assists and three blocks; and Ian Clark dropping 13.
Golden State isn’t a deep team, but they can play like one anyway when they’re at their best. There’s a level they can reach with their unselfishness and ball movement that creates open shots for every on the floor, and when that happens, there’s nothing you can do.
Durant could miss Game 3, too, but of course this isn’t anything new for the Warriors. They dropped some games early in Durant’s absence, but had a 13-game winning streak going by the time he finally did return to the lineup. The Warriors lost depth by signing Durant; they aren’t the same team that won 73 games and nearly the championship without him. But they are still exceedingly good even if they’re buoyed only by the Big Three plus Iguodala, and against a team like Portland, it was no problem at all.
The Warriors move to Portland for the next two games, and even if they don’t have Durant for both of them, they should be favored to complete the sweep with the way the first two have gone. Golden State is one of the best team’s we’ve seen in NBA history, and they can temporarily survive the loss of Durant.
Survive isn’t even the right word, not in Game 2. They absolutely want him back as soon as possible, but the Warriors didn’t just survive him being out — they thrived.
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