» Blog Archive » (Late) Thoughts on Game No. 5: Warriors 111, Nuggets 101
  • Nov
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    (Late) Thoughts on Game No. 5: Warriors 111, Nuggets 101

    By Geoff Lepper
    48minutes.net

    OAKLAND – On a night chock-full of revelations at Oracle Arena, second-year Warriors forward Brandan Wright supplied the exclamation point to Golden State’s 111-101 victory over the Nuggets.

    With 1:12 remaining and Denver trailing and desperate for a hoop, veteran Denver forward Kenyon Martin tried to sneak an extra step closer to the basket. That was all the chance Wright needed to spring forward, bat Martin’s jumper into the air and eventually tap it to C.J. Watson to help seal the victory.

    It was one of three blocks on the evening for Wright, who also tallied a career-high 18 points and 13 rebounds.

    “I just wanted to be a spark and do positive things and hope we get more Ws like tonight,” Wright said.

    Wright was active and assertive on the offensive end, hitting his first seven shots and grabbing six offensive boards. But it was those blocks that stood out the most.

    The Warriors reached double digits in blocks only twice last season, a deficiency they hoped to address by seeing improvement from Wright and signing free agent Ronny Turiaf.

    Andris Biedrins finished with five blocks and Turiaf had two of his own, although they were all upstaged by Kelenna Azubuike, who simply laid waste to a fast-break dunk attempt by Dahntay Jones in the second quarter.

    “Their length inside really allows them to help us out on the defensive end,” said Azubuike, who played the entire second half and finished with 22 points, eight rebounds and four assists. “When we get beat, they are always there in the middle to block or change a shot.”

    Combined with the Nuggets’ almost pathological desire to pass the ball out of bounds — I understand Denver was down to one true point guard (Anthony Carter) while awaiting the arrival of Chauncey Billups, but this was ridiculous — the Warriors showed signs of being a potentially dominant defensive team.

    “They blocked 11 shots, with 20 turnovers that they created,” Nuggets coach George Karl said. “That’s a lot of shots and possessions that they had control over.”

    ** While Wright was setting all kinds of personal bests, fellow 2007 first-round draftee Marco Belinelli and this year’s first-rounder, Anthony Randolph, were put on notice by Nelson that they won’t see significant playing time until their work improves in practice.

    Watson, who set a career-high Wednesday with 14 points and tied another with four assists, rookie starter DeMarcus Nelson and even recently re-signed Rob Kurz are all more likely options to see playing time at the moment.

    “(Kurz) is not as talented as Randolph,” Nelson acknowledged. “I’m not talking talent here. I’m talking about if you put a guy in a game right now, where he’s not going to make an error, he knows what he’s doing. He knows his game and he’s able to play in the system without error. (Randolph) is loaded with talent, but doesn’t have those other things.”

    In other words, do not expect to see any significant playing time for Belinelli and Randolph before January, when Nelson will take stock of his team.

    “We’re trying like heck to win games early to see where we are,” Nelson said. “Let’s look and see where we are in 30 games. If things aren’t looking so well, maybe I’ll give some gifts to the younger guys. But right now, they have to earn their minutes.”

    I told Nelson at shootaround — well prior to his postgame kiss-off of Harrington — that “I think the fans are wondering how much worse Anthony Randolph can be when Al Harrington is going 3-for-15.”

    The coach replied by saying, “One’s a veteran, and one’s a rookie, and I keep hoping the veteran is going to play like he should. And the rookie I know is not (ready) at this point.”

    ** Stephen Jackson, who already leads the league in minutes per game at 44.4, will not be enjoying any relief.

    “For us to win, (Jackson) has to play in the 40s,” Nelson said. “I don’t know how else to do it at this point. And really, (Corey) Maggette is the same. Our team isn’t that strong without two really good players. That’s just the way it’s been, all the way through training camp.”

    ** Marcus Williams has slipped even farther down the depth chart, if that’s possible. With Maggette inactive, the Warriors gave rookie shooter Anthony Morrow a jersey but kept Williams in street clothes.

    Is he completely out of the picture with regards to playing time?

    “He is right now,” Nelson said. “But that doesn’t mean that it’s going to be forever. I don’t know; we’d like to see him, again, play better in the practice sets, play better than the people playing ahead of him right now, and if he does, he’ll move up, and if he doesn’t, why, he’ll be right where he is. These other guys are playing better, they deserve to play ahead of him and are playing ahead of him.”

    Nelson said Williams needs to lose weight and improve his quickness to get back on the floor: “I think he’s a little too heavy to consistently get in the paint, where we would expect that he’d be able to make plays, find open people and things like that.”

    Wondering if part of the problem is that Williams simply wasn’t a guy Nelson wanted, I asked the coach if he had signed off on the move before it was made.

    “I’m not going to discuss things that happened one way or the other,” Nelson said.

    Contact: geofflepper@48minutes.net

20 Responses to “(Late) Thoughts on Game No. 5: Warriors 111, Nuggets 101”

  1. Kenny Seagle, Emperor of the North November 6th, 2008 at 10:30 pm

    get a true distributer PG in there w/ a possible change configuration on the front line– including the new go2 biedrins– and u have a team that can scare the bejeezus out of a lot of teams further along in development, no????

    jax as the PG is a mix blessing….

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