The Golden State Warriors, despite a sluggish, not-so-dominant start to the season, still must be considered the NBA’s gold standard (no pun intended) and the favorites to repeat as NBA champions come June.
But that’s not to say that a third title in four years is automatic — no sir. Every team in the NBA is gunning for Golden State, and while there is a long time between now and the start of the postseason in April, these five teams have pulled away as the Warriors’ top threats to topple their throne this season:
5. Detroit Pistons
Detroit, you may recall, has already beaten the Warriors this season, coming to Oakland and laying a 115-107 defeat at the Warriors’ feet in a contest that should be referred to as “The Avery Bradley Game”.
Bradley, erstwhile Celtic with rambunctious defensive energy, has always given Stephen Curry trouble, and he did it again in that Pistons’ win.
One game — no big deal, right?
Well, the Pistons haven’t slowed down since that win. They’re second in the Eastern Conference with a 14-6 record, and have a 4.1 net rating in the month of November. The Pistons aren’t the top team in the East — by a significant margin — but they are playing great basketball and can’t be ruled out as a possible NBA Finals contender.
If everything goes right between now and June — if the Pistons do make the NBA Finals — they’ll be bad news for the Warriors. Not only does Bradley always seem to have success against Golden State (something that goes back to his time in Boston), but the improved play of center Andre Drummond, who has dramatically improved from the free-throw line (63 percent — he was 38 percent for this career going into this season) and has developed into an excellent playmaker now that Detroit is using him as a high post distributor (3.7 assists per game, up from 0.7 per game for his career).
At 14 points, 15 rebounds, and a combined 6.4 assists, steals, and blocks per game, Drummond is a viable first-team All-NBA candidate and a handful for any team he plays.
The combo of those two players, Drummond and Bradley, alongside the perennially underrated Tobias Harris at the 4 and a strong bench, would without a doubt create a challenging and engaging series should a long shot hit and the Pistons meet the Warriors in June.
4. Boston Celtics
The Celtics’ win over the Warriors on Nov. 16 seems quaint by comparison now, right?
Boston played well, the Warriors played poorly, and Boston eked out a win at home. Good for them.
The key stat from that game: The Warriors shot only 39 percent on uncontested shots.
Beyond that, Stephen Curry made only three field goals in that contest, and worse yet had the Warriors’ only secondary assist.
Simply, the Warriors did not look like The Warriors in that game. Sometimes that happens, and sometimes other teams create that paradigm. The truth from that contest lies somewhere in the middle between the two options. Few teams get to boast that duality.
Boston has the best record in the NBA through 23 games, boast a 6.3 net rating, and boast two of the Warriors’ biggest bugaboos: a ton of long wings (wrecking passing lanes) and Kyrie Irving.
Add in Al Horford, who is having a career year and proved perplexing for the Warriors’ centers in that Boston win, and one of the NBA’s best coaches in Brad Stevens and you have an interesting (to say the least) matchup with Golden State.
While Boston would likely have a hard time with the Warriors in a seven-game series — all you have to do is let Marcus Smart shoot, a la Tony Allen in the 2015 playoffs — don’t underestimate this young team’s ability to improve as the season progresses.
3. Oklahoma City Thunder
Hey, get this, the Thunder beat the Warriors earlier this season as well. We’re 3-for-3 on this list.
Oklahoma City might be deep in struggle town right now, boasting an 8-12 record and having lost five of their last six, but you cannot, under any circumstances, look over their win over the Warriors the day before Thanksgiving — it was a smack down.
Going into this season, I said that the Thunder would be the biggest challenge to the Warriors in the postseason. Things haven’t worked out well for the Thunder thus far, but they still present the toughest matchup to Golden State should the two meet in the postseason. The reason they’re at No. 3 on this list, instead of No. 1 is because, well, there’s no guarantee this team stays together long enough to face the Warriors in the postseason, and there’s no guarantee this team even makes the postseason.
Looking on the positive side — for OKC, that is — when they play at their best, they are nearly tailor made to beat Golden State, as their best lineup boasts an aggressive, downhill-driving point guard, three long wings (two of which can actually play defense, two of which can be offensive dynamos), and an excellent rebounder at center who can draw defenders and fouls in pick-and-roll. When the ball is moving, they’re a matchup nightmare for Golden State.
So the Warriors better hope that Westbrook keeps trying to win another MVP, that Paul George continues to play as if he can’t wait to get to L.A., and that Melo never figures out that he has to change his game for his team to be successful — OKC is a serious challenger with serious problems.
2. Cleveland Cavaliers
Remember all that talk about the Cavs being done after that sluggish start to the season?
LOL, just a bit premature…
Cleveland has rattled off 10 straight wins, posting a net rating of 10.1 during that span of time, with the sixth-best defensive rating in the league (101.9). The Cavs are by no means a perfect team, but they’ve figured things out on the fly, are yet to add Isaiah Thomas into the fold, and have pieces to make a splash trade before the deadline.
They are, by no means, “done”.
Oh yeah, LeBron James is having arguably the best year of his career, averaging 28 points, 8 rebounds, and 8 assists per game while shooting career highs from behind the arc and from the field.
This is the team to beat in the Eastern Conference (as if they ever stopped being that) and with a re-tooled team around LeBron (for better or worse) you can’t expect the same kind five-game whoopin’ the Warriors put on the Cavs last season to come to pass.
1. Houston Rockets
There could be no other team in the No. 1 spot — the Rockets look every bit like a team capable of taking the Warriors’ top spot.
Since Chris Paul returned to the Rox’s lineup, Houston is playing out-of-this-world basketball, posting a net rating of 21.1, with a true shooting percentage of 62.4. On the season, they’re shooting an absurd 44 3-pointers per game, more than 10 more than the next-best team, the Nets (and 28 percent more than the Warriors), and they are playing really good defense to boot.
For all of those who thought the combination of James Harden and Chris Paul wouldn’t work… you were so, so, so wrong. You probably thought Kevin Durant wouldn’t work with the Warriors and somehow didn’t learn.
These guys are already simpatico. They’re only going to get better in the coming weeks and months.
If not for the Warriors, the NBA would be in full-fledged Rocket Mania right now, and if Houston wins when the two alpha-teams play on Jan. 4 in Space City — which would make them 2-for-2 on the season against Golden State — there will be little we can do to hold off the takes.
The real question: How will the two teams stack up in a seven-game series? Well, it’s hard to see Ryan Anderson staying on the court, but that could be a bad thing for the Warriors — it means more of what might be the best lineup in the NBA and an incredible counteraction to the Warriors’ small ball lineup with Draymond Green at center: Any five-man combination with P.J. Tucker at center, and James Harden and Paul at guard. So far this season, that triumvirate has a net rating of 33.
I have to imagine that the Warriors would win the series, but I sure would like to see it. For this Houston team, anything is possible.