Draymond Green: Golden State Warriors will be fine, we dominated for 42 minutes | NBA News

Draymond Green brushed any suggestions the Golden State Warriors should be concerned after dropping Game 1 of the NBA Finals at home to the Boston Celtics.

The Celtics claimed a 120-108 victory in the series opener after a dramatic fourth-quarter fightback, becoming the first team in NBA Finals history to win by double-digits after entering the fourth quarter trailing by double digits.

Boston thrashed their hosts in the final frame by 40 points to 16 but Green, who already has three championship rings with the Warriors, pointed to the quality of the Celtics’ shooting as evidence that the Warriors need not be concerned entering Game 2 on Sunday, also at Chase Center.

“They stayed within striking distance and they made shots late,” Green said.

“They hit 21 threes and Marcus Smart, Al Horford and Derrick White combined for 15. Those guys are good shooters, but they combined for what… 15-for-23, from those guys. We’ll be fine.”

Horford set a Finals debut record with six 3-pointers on eight attempts, also the most in a single game for his career, while Smart finished 4-for-7 and White, off the bench, went 5-for-8 from beyond the arc.

“We’ll be fine. We’ll figure out the ways we can stop them from getting those threes and take them away. I don’t think it was a rhythm thing. We pretty much dominated the game for the first 41, 42 minutes, so we’ll be fine.”

it was a game of momentum swings and it swung hugely in the Celtics’ favour in the fourth.

Green himself had just four points for Golden State on 2 for 12 shooting in 38 minutes, as well as 11 rebounds, five assists and two steals.

Warriors coach Steve Kerr blamed looseness at the start of the fourth for allowing the game to slip away.

“We had a couple of turnovers, a couple of bad possessions offensively and they just pounced,” Kerr said. “They took advantage of every opportunity, and moved the ball well. [If] you make five, six threes in a row in the fourth quarter, that’s tough to overcome.

“We’ll watch the tape and learn from it and see what we can do better. My gut reaction [on] what I just witnessed was they just came in, played a hell of a fourth quarter, and you’ve got to give them credit. It’s pretty much as simple as that.”

Another couple of elements that Green may have failed to consider was the offensive explosion of Stephen Curry, where he set a new NBA record by nailing six 3-pointers in the first quarter on his way to 21 points in the opening frame and 34 points overall.

Contrast that with the fact that Boston’s main scorer Jayson Tatum went just 3-for-17 from the field, scoring 12 points. He did provide 13 assists with just two turnovers though, and that factor pleased Celtics coach Ime Udoka.

“I’ve talked to him at length about impacting the game, when he’s not having his best offensive night,” Udoka said. “Obviously going 3-for-17, that’s usually not going to happen. But what he did well and did early was getting others involved in seven or nine assists pretty early in the game and finished with 13.

“[Even when] the shot’s not falling, he still attracts a good amount of attention, [he] made the right plays and [I] love his growth and progression in those areas, where he’s still guarding on defense and still getting others involved, not pouting about his shots and trying to play through some mistakes and some physicality that they were playing with him.

“So while they went to a box-and-one (defensive scheme) on him to try to take him out, it made it tough at times, but that’s why we’re a team. We don’t rely on one guy and you saw the [rest of the team] step up tonight.”

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