Posts tagged ‘Raptors’

Your Warriors won their last regular season battle against the East in typically dramatic fashion.

Box Score

The Dubs ran circles around the Raps in the first quarter. Monta and Peety took turns scoring on a stiff looking Toronto squad while Baron was content to lay in the cut and look for open teammates. The Raptors were without their superstar, Chris Bosh, and it exposed their soft middle. The basket was wide open for drives and the Warriors took advantage, going up by 18 points at the end of one.

Toronto bounced back nicely behind endless made jump shots from the entire roster. Both members of their interchangeable point guard pod - Jose Calderon and TJ Ford - took turns making probing forays into the paint before passing out to a shooter or scoring on their own. Ford in particular looked like he was out for his and ended the game with 23 points and 8 assists. The Warriors got caught up hefting unsuccessful threes and the Raptors kept chipping away until they actually took a 1-point lead (96-95) with 6 minutes left in the game.

With a very important game in danger of slipping away in the final minutes Baron finally took over. After getting down by 1 the Warriors went on a 22-10 tear against the Raps, with Baron having a hand in all but 5 of those points.

Final 6 minutes of offfense from the Dubs:

• Monta layup - assist Baron
• Andris layup - assist Baron
• Pietrus layup - assist Baron
• Monta layup - assist Pietrus
• Jack step back jumper
• Andris layup - assist Baron
• Jack three - assist Baron
• Baron step back jumper
• Baron layup
• Baron three

That’s some captivatin’ Captainatin’ I tell you what. The first quarter was a bit of a youth movement, with Monta stealing the show. With the game on the line in the fourth it was all Boom.

Despite losing the large lead I liked the energy from the Dubs. The defense was active, forcing 16 turnovers (TOR averages 11), and all of the starters contributed double digit scoring. Monta put up yet another sick line - 33 points (14-19!), 6 boards, and 4 assists. Baron dished 15. Pietrus had another excellent showing despite some foul trouble - 14 points, 8 boards. Matt Barnes came in to do some dirty work and ended up with 7 boards (3 offensive).

40 wins and it’s all West from here on out. It’s the new look Suns tonight on TNT, Go Warriors!

exclusive postgame audio

Monta Ellis

Baron Davis

Andris speaks on surgery, Vegas, his love of magic and cats, and his bff Zarko:

And then I went to the animal show. This guy, Gregory Popovich, he has his own show where he teaches cats to do crazy stuff. I had a cat when I was back home and I love cats, so the show was really cool. The cats were standing on two legs pushing carts and walking on the tall stilts, it was crazy stuff. It was ridiculous. He has 16 cats on the stage and every cat he had taught something. It was funny.

Tim Kawakami has an extended Q&A with Nellie, Baron, and Jack about the Warriors’ picking up Nelson’s option and a bunch of other team biz:

 -Q: Will you talk to Baron about this?

-NELSON: I’m going to talk to Baron and Jack for sure. I won’t talk to everybody because some of them are mad at me and I know they’d say, ‘Why don’t you get out!’ It might sound good to them, too.There’s a few people that we’re building around and I think I already know their answer, but it’s important that we’re all on the same page.

Jeff Wong wrote on why the Raptors should be scurred of Monta, and he enlisted a squad of the best local bloggers to break down All Day’s game:

History smacks Raptors fans upside the head with this fact: our Raps have trouble defending athletic wing players. And few are as athletic and wingy as tonight’s opponent, Monta Ellis (a.k.a. “The Mississippi Bullet”) of the Golden State Warriors.