Oakland, CA -- Stephen Curry looked in mid-season form as the Golden State Warriors cruise past the New Orleans Pelicans 111-95 on opening night.
The Wariors rasied their championship banner and got their rings tonight, as "Trophies" by Drake played through the speakers. Steve Kerr did attend the award ceremony but his back still isn't strong enough so he would exit and head into the locker room to recover.
Steph posted a 40 point, 6 rebound, and 7 assist stat-line on the night, shooting 14/26 from the field and 5/12 from three. Ezeli and Bogut scored 13 and 12 respectively, while Klay Thompson scored just 9.
The Warriors did an incredible job defending Anthony Davis. Davis was held to 18 points on 4/20 shooting from the field. Here, Festus Ezeli sends one of Davis' shots back. The whole night the Warriors played him well defensively and that combined with an off-night shooting for him, the Warriors were very successful.
Stephen Curry was a beast this evening, scoring 24 points in the first quarter. He was on fire shooting 8/11 in that quarter and just bringing back the same things he was doing last season.
The Warriors continued where the left off last year in the regular season by just blowing past teams with team basketball. The absence of Steve Kerr wasn't shown much tonight, which is probably the best case scenario for interim head coach Luke Walton. The last thing Luke needs is the media questioning him as a coach while Kerr is absent. The Warriors need a few of these wins with Walton coaching so that not only his confidence goes up as a coach, but also the Warriors themselves don't miss a beat during the beginning of this season.
The Warriors only shot 9-30 from behind the arc, so that is one area they obviously need to get a little better at. That will come in due time throughout the season. There were many critics that didn't think the Warriors could duplicate the kind of percentages they had last season, but this writer thinks otherwise. The Warriors have all the talent and skill and young potential to duplicate the percentages. They may not duplicate the total amount of wins from last year, but they for sure will be able to dominate night in and night out.
New Orleans heads to Portland to play on a back-to-back, while the Warriors face off against the Rockets in Houston on Saturday. The Pelicans have many players injured currently, so they'll be short-handed for a little while, and the Warriors did have Bogut exit the game with what seems to be a nose injury. He'll be someone to keep focus on to see his status on what actually happened and if it will keep him sidelined at all.