By: Justin Rosquites, EBC Sports International, Florida Bureau
(Oakland,CA) – After a convincing win in game 1, the Golden State Warriors found themselves in rhythm and continued their stride to a dominating win over the Portland Trailblazers in game 2. Even without their dominant scorer, Kevin Durant, who was out with a calf injury , they managed to generate production off of the bench. Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson combined 35 points. Backup big man, Javale McGee scored all 7 of his attempted field goals , notching in 15 points and 4 blocked shots. Ian Clark scored 13 points. Overall the Warriors had 44 percent field goal shooting to Portland’s 33.3 percent.
“You want to try to promote ball movement when they get the play on their hands and the post and finish plays in the paint , it helps us out a huge amount”, Curry said referring to the the bigs on the team.
However, with a well-balanced attack , the warriors came up big when it came to their defense . Warriors Head Coach, Steve Kerr stated,
“We put a lot of pressure on them and we stayed with it and set a good tone right away. […]Our defense was the key”.
He also credited every player’s contribution to their success.
“We feel like we have a very deep team and we needed that tonight . We needed every guy and they came through”, Kerr said.
On the other side of the ball, the Blazers strong backcourt duo of CJ McCollum and Damian Lillard combined only 23 points and 9 for 34 field goals. Lillard stated,
“I thought they played a more aggressive game at the end of the floor. So they got away with a lot. They were able to play really physical , and it went into their favor”.
The Warriors, with 11 blocked shots, had their most blocks in a playoff game since 1994 against Phoenix. Now, the Warriors will face the Blazers with a commanding 2-0 lead in the series in Portland, where the blazers hope to get a win in front of their home crowd.
