By Geoff Lepper
48minutes.net

It was the end of a difficult five-games-in-seven-days road trip. Their captain and team leader was on the bench in street clothes because of a badly swollen and sprained left wrist. They were facing a highly motivated ex-teammate who wanted to prove a point.

The Warriors better hope one of those excuses holds water. Because when Golden State dropped a not-nearly-that-close 138-125 decision to the New York Knicks on Saturday for its sixth consecutive defeat, it wasn’t just a loss.

It was comprehensive surrender. Total capitulation.

So total, in fact, that Lowell Cohn of the Santa Rosa Press Democrat said he saw Warriors coach Don Nelson leaving the bench several seconds before the final horn sounded. Honestly, I didn’t catch that, but I can’t say it would shock me if it was true. Whenever the camera caught showed a glimpse of Nelson on Saturday, he looked to me like a CEO who was stuck testifying before a Congressional sub-committee — someone supremely interested in being anywhere but there at that moment in that time.

New York Knicks guard Chris Duhon drives on Golden State Warriors center Andris Biedrins (AP photo/Frank Franklin II)

Of course, you’d probably look like that, too, if your team was allowing a mid-level talent such as Chris Duhon to break a Knicks franchise record that had stood for nearly a half-century. Duhon had 22 assists, or one more than Richie Guerin notched on Dec. 12, 1958.

“Wow, what a player,” Nelson said. “He looked like Steve Nash out there. Unbelievable performance. Whether we zoned him, switched him, it didn’t matter. He still found a way to hurt us. Really impressive performance.”

The utter inability to even hint at an effective countermeasure to the Knicks’ high pick-and-roll — which David Lee rode to a career-high 37 points and 21 rebounds — was enough to render a Warriors fan nonsensical with rage.

The Warriors consistently tried to stop Duhon (or Anthony Roberson) by having the big man step out on him, either to switch fully, or merely to impede his progress momentarily. But one of two things would happen:

New York Knicks forward/center David Lee in a familiar pose from Saturday: Readying himself for a two-handed jam (AP photo/Frank Franklin II)

A) The smaller defender would fail to properly cover Lee on the roll, providing an engraved invitation for Duhon to find Lee immediately with a pass for a two-handed dunk;

or B) Duhon would sail right around…