Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson have been relatively quiet thus far in NBA Finals, combining for only 55 points between them through two games. But don’t confuse that low number on the score sheet with a lack of overall impact. They’ve still played a key role in the Warriors carving up the Cavaliers’ leaky defense en route to a 2-0 series lead.
The difference is their role is less direct. Instead of raining fire like they did to close out the Oklahoma City Thunder, the “Splash Brothers” have been decoys against a Cavaliers team that’s sold out to limit their effectiveness. Cleveland is attempting to switch off-ball screens and trap pick-and-rolls to deny the Splash Brothers opportunities, but Golden State has exploited this strategy with quick decisions and smart passing to get easy baskets.
It doesn’t help that the Cavaliers haven’t soundly executed their game plan thanks to less-than-ideal personnel and miscommunication, but the Warriors’ brilliance is making them look especially bad.
This sequence from Game 1 was one of the starkest examples of the Splash Brothers’ decoy power. Three Cavaliers followed Thompson across the court, leading to a wide open Festus Ezeli dunk:
We again saw the “Klay Effect” right at the start of Game 2:
As Klay Thompson looped around Draymond Green, Tristan Thompson was so concerned about him that his quick rotation created the necessary opening for Green to make an aggressive move to the basket and score on a floater.
Here’s a play from the third quarter of Game 2, where two defenders stuck with Klay on his dart to the corner, leaving Leandro Barbosa under the basket for an easy layup:
Credit also goes to Andre Iguodala, who calmly pushed the ball up the floor to create this opportunity and directed traffic before firing off the perfect bullet pass to Barbosa. Iguodala, like the other Warriors players, has the type of game that unlocks the Splash Brothers’ effectiveness as decoys. The Warriors are full of savvy, do-it-all veterans like Iguodala that can come in and take over playmaking duties while the guards wreak havoc off the ball.
On this next play, we see Curry’s gravity help Green wind up with a good look and then a basket on a putback. :
Curry started this play in the opposite corner before jogging around a couple of screens to wind up on the wing. As they’ve been doing, the Cavaliers switched all the screens to get Tristan Thompson, their most able rim protector and rebounder on the floor, to basically face-guard Curry at the three-point line. Meanwhile, Green, Thompson’s original man, took advantage of the switching to seal J.R. Smith and get a layup attempt. Although he missed, the extra effort by Andrew Bogut and Green resulted in a putback bucket, all while Thompson stayed out of the play to guard Curry on the perimeter.
Here’s one final example of the Cavaliers honing in on Klay Thompson:
This shows the Warriors’ true power. LeBron James focused on Thompson coming around a screen a split-second too long, which allowed Green to slip the screen and beat James to the basket for the bucket. That’s all the inattentiveness the Warriors need to score. And, again, Iguodala was there to deliver the brilliant pass.
These are just a few examples of the positive impact the Warriors’ All-Star guards make even when not doing what they do best in getting buckets. Thompson in particular did a nice job as a playmaker, racking up five assists in Game 2, which is more than twice his postseason average. On three separate occasions, his drive-and-kicks led to open Green threes as the Cavaliers collapsed their defense on the drive.
The Splash Brothers’ hidden impact puts Cleveland in a major bind entering Game 3. Cleveland’s defensive strategy in Games 1 and 2 had them bleeding points, but changing it up too much may just lead to Curry and Thompson getting cleaner looks to fire away. That’s the pick-your-poison nature of the Warriors’ offense, and it’s a big reason why they’re a historic team looking primed to repeat as champions.
This article was written by Jason Patt from SB Nation and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.
