The Wiggins-Draymond sequence highlights the caged Warriors appeared in the original NBC Sports Bayara
SAN FRANCISCO — The Warriors Flyers made their first ever home court shootout Wednesday night 121-106 Game 5 win vs The Los Angeles Lakers were a Western Conference semifinalist 3-pointer elimination that helped ignite the Chase Center crowd.
They didn’t come from Steph Curry or Klay Thompson. They came from Draymond Green and Andrew Wiggins.
That was a sneak peek into the monster offerings from Green and Wiggins. Offense is secondary to both of them, though, until Wiggins. What really highlighted how sandwiched the two were was a defensive masterpiece just over three minutes into the fourth quarter.
After an offensive error by Anthony Davis and a dunk Divincenzo, the Lakers could have picked up the momentum they did in their Game 4 win. Wiggins had other ideas.
Instead of waiting for LeBron James and the Lakers to get into a half-court attack, Wiggins snapped James well on the other side of the floor. chase him. He was aggressive and refused to be given any space.
“I feel like I’m just being aggressive,” Wiggins said when asked about his strategy for defending a future Hall of Famer. “If you see him put the ball out, you just have to catch it. You know, it’s a long game and we know that even if I put myself in a bad spot, I trust my teammates who have my back.”
It’s been thought of in real time, too.
The 250-pound James (as listed) tried to body and get Wiggins out of his way. But Wiggins had other plans. He flicked the ball wide and it came right back at LeBron before trailing him on the way to the basket. There, DiVincenzo and Green were waiting to protect the cordon.
Wiggins’ relentless effort was rewarded with Draymond blocking on Anthony Davis before Green led the Warriors offense. Watch yourself.
Grabbing his save, Green quickly got the ball back in his hands and the end result was Gary Payton’s second move to the free throw line after Davies’ foul. Payton nailed two free throws. He and Green Wiggins — three defensive stars — finished second, third, and fourth on the Warriors’ scoring list while combined to go 12-of-13 in the charity strip.
What could have cut the Lakers’ deficit to nine points ended up being a four-point swing in favor of the Warriors as Davis made a mistake.
“Oh, he just doesn’t back down from a challenge,” Green said of Wiggins. “We all know LeBron and his ability to play. The power he comes down to. But Wiggs met the challenge. Like I said, he met the power. With him picking up LeBron like that, we know we have to build a wall behind him.” Bronn was able to get to the paint, And I rose and was forced down and was able to return to Milady and bridge the immersion.
“But when you have a guy like that who puts his body on the line, gives all the energy and effort that it takes — like, when you’re guarding LeBron there, he slams into you. Most guards will just try to dodge and get around you. He hits you with a body. It takes a lot of energy.” So when you have a guy like that putting in that much energy, as a teammate, you have to be ready to get behind him.
“You can’t let him expend that energy and then drop something easy behind the play. So, as for us, we were ready. Once he started catching, we built the wall and then we just played and were able to do some plays.”
When asked if he felt tired of James when he was 38 years old, Wiggins even admitted that it might feel like one play and then he could throw LeBron the next possession. The proof is in the numbers.
After scoring 17 points in the first half of his 13 points in the second quarter, James scored only eight points in the second half – four per quarter.
“Wiggs, we’re asking a lot of him defensively and in any playoff series he’s going to end up with the opposition’s best wing player,” said Steve Kerr. So in this series it’s obviously LeBron. And thank God we have Wiggs, because he can play all night, he can pressure on the court, he can guard in the halfcourt and stay in front of people.
“And on that particular play, he lifted LeBron really high and then Draymond was behind the play to help him. It was a great sequence.”
Related: Draymond credits Stellar 5 for being “earful” from Izzo
Offensively, Wiggins finished with 25 points of offense and also drained 2 of 3-pointers. He did not score 20 points over the first four games and averaged 14.8 points for the series. The Green averaged just 6.8 points. By the end of the first quarter, he has already exceeded this mark.
Draymond is down 20 points for the second time this postseason, both Warriors wins, and they are now 35-8 all time in the playoffs when scoring 15 or more points.
Set the tone tandem from the beginning. The Lakers could have been breathing in the fourth quarter, but Wiggins and Green plucked air from their two biggest stars and showed what the standard the Warriors must be to win two more games and come back another 3-1.