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Notes after Warriors get demolished by Mavericks, waste prime playoff opportunity

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© Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports


I mean, good grief. You can sometimes make the argument that the first half of basketball games don’t matter much. That argument didn’t hold water on Tuesday night. Golden State was lambasted, torched, *insert other humiliating adverbs*. It was an absolute beatdown, and mostly self-imposed. With a chance to begin a run at the No. 6 seed, they didn’t come remotely close, losing 133-103.

Unbelievably bad in the first

The Warriors trailed 38-12 in the first quarter. From the 8:40 mark in the first quarter, after a Stephen Curry three, to the 11:22 mark in the second quarter, Golden State was on the wrong end of a 28-0 run.

This was more abysmal shooting from the Warriors than it was outstanding offense from the Mavericks. Dallas was great, and improved as the game went on, with Doncic leading the way in absurd fashion, but especially early on, it was pure incompetence from the Warriors on a grand, embarrassing scale.

With a win, they could have closed the gap to the sixth seed to 1.5 games and grabbed a tiebreaker over the Mavericks. Instead, they’re likely headed for a play-in game, with the only thing left to sort out whether they’ll have an advantage in those games. But hey, they could still fall to 11th and miss out completely.

A relentless Luka Doncic

This was nonsense from Doncic.

He was at his most step-back-iest, going full blown magician, hitting just about every shot he took. There’s something about Doncic that’s very Curry like. They share the same evident joy for the game, and both demonstrate a consistent capacity to knock down shots from otherworldly ranges, from angles that defy logic and/or gravity.

Golden State had zero recipe for Doncic. Like Curry, he only played three quarters, but it was for the reason that Curry sat so many quarters in prior years; a blowout win.

In 28 minutes, Doncic had 39 points (15-of-23, 4-of-10 from three), 8 assists, 6 rebounds and a couple of steals.

Curry plays well, no one else does

It’s rare that Stephen Curry is done by the end of the third quarter. Prior to 2019, that was usually an enormously positive sign. In all likelihood, Golden State had created such a massive lead that there was only risk in keeping Curry in the game.

Those days are in the past. This was a night where, like in the past, there was only risk in keeping Curry in the game, but the Warriors were on the wrong end of a blowout.

He was his usual self, but no one else was. In 30 minutes, Curry finished with 27 points, 2 steals, 2 assists and a rebound. His 9-of-18 shooting from the field and 5-of-9 from three made him the only Warriors player who shot 50 percent of better… and it wasn’t even close.

As a team, Golden State shot 40.5 percent from the field and 37.2 percent from three. Excluding Curry, though, they shot 37.9 percent from the field and 32.4 percent from three.

This just about sums it up.