The Golden State Warriors
Or How They Beat the Mavs and Shocked the World
The Golden State Warriors are in the second round of the NBA playoffs after defeating the Dallas Mavericks, Thursday night. Wait a second, is this right?
The Golden State Warriors did something on Thursday night that they haven’t experienced in over a decade, they advanced in the playoffs.
This is truly a rare feat for a team who has had a vacancy in the basement of the Western Conference for a long time. Throughout the late 90s and into this decade, it was always the LA Clippers and the Warriors, the laughing stock of a league.
Who’s laughing now? Well certainly, it’s not the Dallas Mavericks. The Mavericks won 67 games this season.
Yet six games after the regular season ended, the Mavs find themselves doing the same thing every other NBA fan will be doing the next month and a half, watching the playoffs.
The no.-1 seed in not only the Western Conference, but the entire NBA have nobody to blame but themselves for their lack of effort.
The Mavs were the odds-on favorite to win it all. Just look at all the talent, from Dirk Nowitzki and Josh Howard, to Devin Harris and Jason Terry. This was a failure on all parts for the Mavs.
The Mavs knew they lost three regular season meetings to the Warriors and they knew that the eighth seed had nothing to lose.
This series belonged to the Mavericks, but they never grasped at the opportunity. Failure wasn’t suppose to be an option, but it was.
But enough about the Mavs, they had every chance to prove themselves and continue on in the second round, but they didn’t.
What an amazing story for all NBA fans to witness, an eighth seed in the second round of the playoffs. That has not happened since the lockout year in 1999, when the New York Knicks beat the Miami Heat on their way to the NBA Finals.
What makes this scenario different from the Knicks’, as well as the Denver Nuggets upset over the Sonics in 1994, is the fact that this series was a seven game series, while the other two went five.
One question needs to be asked, can the Warriors continue their playoff run into the Conference Finals, or even the NBA Finals?
If the dominos fall correctly for this passionate team, anything is possible. They have incredible leadership from Baron Davis and a starting lineup that has talented shooters, such as Stephen Jackson, Matt Barnes and Jason Richardson.
Let’s not forget about Don Nelson, the coach of the Warriors, he did a terrific job keeping this team’s eyes on the prize.
This team leaves it all out on the floor and that leaves a lot to be admired.
