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Jordan Poole's Dominance Without Steph Lionized by NBA Twitter as Warriors Beat Cavs
January 21, 2023
The shorthanded Golden State Warriors defeated the Cleveland Cavaliers 120-114 on Friday night at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse for just their sixth road victory of the season.
Golden State opted to rest Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, Draymond Green and Andrew Wiggins on the second night of a back-to-back, but bench players Jordan Poole, Ty Jerome, Donte DiVincenzo, JaMychal Green and Jonathan Kuminga combined to lead the team to victory.
Poole was particularly impressive, finishing with 32 points, three rebounds and two assists in 41 minutes. He made 10-of-23 shots from the floor and 5-of-12 shots from beyond the arc.
Poole is the future at point guard in the post-Curry era, and NBA Twitter praised the 23-year-old for his performance in Curry's absence on Friday:
Poole is in the midst of his best season in the NBA. He entered Friday's game averaging 21.1 points, 2.7 rebounds and 4.4 assists in 45 games while shooting 43.5 percent from the floor and 31.5 percent from deep.
That said, it's clear he still has a lot of work to do in his development before the franchise can rely on him fully in the absence of Curry, especially considering he made some simple mistakes in Friday's win.
The Warriors improved to 23-23 on the season with Friday's win. They still sit ninth in the Western Conference.
