48minutes.net

By Geoff Lepper
48minutes.net

OAKLAND — While Baron Davis and his Clippers were getting waxed from the get-go by the Lakers on Wednesday, the Warriors really could have used his expertise in the final moments at Oracle Arena.

Tied with 1:56 to go, the Warriors were outscored 7-2 the rest of the way.

Golden State missed its last five shots, had a critical possession go awry when it couldn’t complete a simple inbounds pass and watched the New Orleans Hornets take a 108-103 victory to begin the 2008-09 2007-08 season.

A year ago, the Warriors’ plan would have been simple: Put the ball in BD’s hands and get the hell out of the way. Golden State went 9-2 in games decided by three points or less last season using that M.O.

This time . . . not so much.

“We went where we got decent looks. We didn’t make them,” Warriors coach Don Nelson said. “Last year, Baron made all of them. That doesn’t happen all the time, either. . . . I thought we just had one of those years last year where we made all of them. I think we won six or seven games with game-winners and probably only missed one.”

The Warriors didn’t get that chance Wednesday. Down 104-103 with 14.2 seconds left, a clearly fatigued Stephen Jackson tried to inbound the ball to Corey Maggette, only to have it bounce out of bounds, allowing the Hornets to build their lead to three points. Al Harrington up-faked Chris Paul out of the way to get an open look at a 3-pointer, but it missed. And that was the end of the Warriors’ chances.

** So much for the deeper, more talented Warriors bench. Jackson played all 48 minutes — guarding Paul, then Tyson Chandler and everyone in between — Kelenna Azubuike was on for 43, and Harrington for 42. The Warriors only used two reserves for any length of time. Brandan Wright, the second-year forward who allegedly had earned a place in Nelson’s rotation, was nowhere to be found, along with Anthony Randolph, Marcus Williams and Marco Belinelli.

“I told the subs that I’m not going to be able to play these guys this many minutes on this next road trip or for long periods of time, so we’re going to use our bench more as we move on,” Nelson said. “I chose really just to play six or seven guys most of the minutes tonight. I thought we needed to do that to have a chance to win this game.

“(Jackson) missed a few assignments because I think of fatigue, and it was just one of those things I thought I’d go with him the whole way. I thought about resting him for a few minutes here and there, but I didn’t want to do that tonight. I wanted to win this game for the fans.”

** The screen-and-roll remains better named hit-and-miss, something Nelson knows must change if the Warriors are to stave off mediocrity: “We just don’t run the screen-and-roll as well as we did when Baron was here. And that was a huge weapon for us. We’re going to have to have it before too long into the season, but I didn’t have enough confidence to run very many of them tonight, and until we get a little better.”

** The DeMarcus Nelson Era got off to a rough start. With Jackson shadowing Paul, Nelson had to guard Peja Stojakovic, who straight-up abused his ridiculous height advantage to score six of the Hornets’ 10 points in the opening 2 1/2 minutes.

** Don Nelson commented a couple of times recently about his concern for his team-wide ball-handling and passing abilities, pointing to the Warriors’ 20.7 turnovers-per-game average in the preseason (second-worst in the league). Wednesday, they did a good job keeping hold of the ball, limiting themselves to 13 turnovers even though Jackson played the point for 33 minutes.

** Jackson went 5-for-12 on 3-pointers, but some of his misses were straight out of the Davis playbook, such as the pull-up 3-point air ball with 18 seconds left on the shot clock after the Warriors had opened an 11-point lead in the second quarter.

** Monta Ellis was on the inactive list with Anthony Morrow and Richard Hendrix. According to a team spokesman, after three games on the IL, the Warriors can transfer Ellis to the suspended list for the remainder of his 30-game ban. That means Golden State can sign an extra player and keep them until Dec. 15.

Somewhere, Rob Kurz’s phone is ringing.

Contact: geofflepper@48minutes.net

Thanks to the efforts of Warriors assistant coach and video guru Travis Schlenk, I got a chance last night to watch a DVD of the team’s exhibition opener in New Orleans on Sunday.

My initial reaction? If this had been the regular season, it would not have been a three-point game. Instead, the Hornets would have won by 12-15. At least.

My second reaction? My God, where has the Warriors’ offense gone?

Without Baron Davis and Monta Ellis, Golden State no longer has a player who can be relied upon to take his man off the dribble with regularity. Remember the days of drive-and-kick fondly — you’re not going to see much of that until Ellis returns.

In the absence of those old standbys, the Warriors are going to be posting up far more than ever before in the previous two seasons. Al Harrington, Stephen Jackson, Corey Maggette, Andris Biedrins and Ronny Turiaf all got their chances Sunday to turn their back on a defender — mainly in the mid-post range, 10-12 feet from the hoop — and try to force the defense to double-team, opening up shots for other players.

For some guys, such as Turiaf, things worked out great. He notched a team-high seven assists, as Adam Lauridsen pointed out, although the degree of difficulty on a few of those passes was not that high: three were simple handoffs out of the high post for 20-footers from players who were using Turiaf’s bulk to screen out their man.

The others were more demanding. One came on a pick-roll with Jackson that turned into a give-and-go; immediately after receiving the ball, Turiaf fed it back to Jackson for an open 18-footer. The remaining three were passes that rewarded teammates — specifically, Maggette, Harrington and Marco Belinelli — for their nice cuts to the rim.

But the absence of dribble penetration was stark, and it highlighted exactly why Anthony Randolph has jumped from 19-year-old know-nothing to possible rotation player. Randolph gobbles up territory on the move, and has enough handles to beat most 4s. One memorable possession: Randolph went up to collect a long offensive rebound, turned to face the hoop from 17 feet out, got David West to bite on an up-fake, and then needed just one dribble to get to the cup.

Unfortunately, the Hornets responded by having West use his superior bulk to pin Randolph 6 feet from the hoop on two of their next three possessions, and Nelson pulled the rookie to prevent him from fouling out in 6 minutes or less.

POSITIVES:

** As he has in practice, Harrington looked good. He had a great swat from behind on Hilton Armstrong, moved his feet quickly enough to draw a charge on West.

** Turiaf was solid. As opposed to last season, when Nelson was often forced to play Harrington at center because the team was bereft of other options behind Biedrins (Adonal Foyle having been bought out and Patrick O’Bryant all but banished from participation), Turiaf should take care of that role easily.

** DeMarcus Nelson has no fear as a defender, stepping in the way of a flying Julian Wright to take a charge. He also made a great darting steal off a kick-out pass. Too bad that came immediately after he senselessly dribbled into a corner, got trapped by a double-team and threw the ball away. Don Nelson claims “I can put up with some deficiencies when a guy guards every game,” but DeMarcus may push that to the limit.

** Belinelli hit several open shots, something he didn’t do nearly enough of last season. If he can repeat that with regularity, he will find time on the floor.

NEGATIVES:

** Neither C.J. Watson nor Marcus Williams had a performance worth remembering at the defensive end. Both of them were torched repeatedly by Chris Paul (who looks like he won’t be denied the MVP award this season), which is somewhat understandable. However, Williams couldn’t come close to even slowing down Mike James, and that’s a very worrisome fact. Because of the Hornets’ ease of ball penetration, the Warriors had to do an awful lot of scrambling to try to recover defensively, affording New Orleans far too many easy looks.

** The Hornets were all over the Jackson-Biedrins screen-roll play. It worked the first time they ran it, and then got stopped cold the rest of the night. Given how important that’s been to the team in the last two years, that’s a bad sign.

** Davis may be gone, but the dribble-dribble-dribble-hoist-an-off-balance-20-footer play remains in full effect. There were way too many of those, especially from Jackson.

** The Warriors were credited with only 10 fast-break points, and even that felt like too many. Without Ellis to streak downcourt for uncontested layups and lacking Davis’ savvy in picking the most efficient option in transition, the break didn’t have much of a pulse.

Presumably, when matched up against a team without a first-team All-NBA point guard, the Warriors will force more turnovers, leading in turn to more fast-break opportunities. Golden State better hope so, because the half-court options are none too appetizing at the moment.

– Geoff