The Golden State Warriors defense has stepped up in this series with the Sacramento Kings, who entered the postseason as the No. 1 offense in the NBA. The key has been shutting down Domantas Sabonis, and bballgodsblog expects him to struggle again.
dynasty, the open secret about the unrivaled success of this Warriors era is that they have always been a better defensive team than an offensive one. So when faced with the No. 1 overall offense in the league as their first round opponent in the, it was the ultimate litmus test as to whether this current group of Golden State players still had it, or if the dynasty had gasped its last.
While the story is not fully written yet, what has been plain to see through five games is that the Warriors' defense is still capable of hitting a gear no other team in the NBA can touch. While the individual brilliance of Draymond Green and Kevon Looney has played a key part, it's largely been Golden State’s overall gameplan discipline that has won the day.’ playmaking while mostly living with man-to-man coverage against everyone else.
Golden State has played way off Sabonis from the jump, locking and trailing the shooters working off his handoffs but daring him to shoot open jumpers from the free-throw line extended. The Warriors are shading off Sabonis in such a deep drop that they can disrupt any potential passing angles. Green and/or Looney are then in position to rebound and deny the rim.
The Kings never found a way to deal with this coverage, so in Game 5 they tried to make the Warriors pay for it by simply having Sabonis step into his jump shot aggressively. Sabonis ended up going 4-for-7 on shots outside the restricted area – solid enough, but an acceptable trade-off for Golden State, since it allows the Warriors to shut the tap off on the Kings' bread-and-butter offensive sets.
Sabonis averaged 7.3 assists per game in the regular season, but is down to 4.4 against the Warriors. He’s had four or fewer helpers in all but one game this series. With the Warriors' defense working to perfection and the Kings' answers all leading them to look for playmaking elsewhere, I’m banking on that trend to continue in Game 6.’s turnover prop at 3.5 .
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