Rockets vs. Warriors: Game 5 Score and Twitter Reaction from 2016 NBA Playoffs
The Golden State Warriors are just fine without Stephen Curry for the time being.
Two days after the team received word that Curry would likely be out a minimum of two weeks with a Grade 1 MCL sprain in his right knee, the Warriors ended the Houston Rockets' season and clinched a spot in the second round of the NBA playoffs with a 114-81 blowout win at Oracle Arena on Wednesday night.
The 33-point margin of victory was the fourth-largest in Warriors postseason franchise history, according to Basketball-Reference.com.
In the wire-to-wire rout, Klay Thompson looked sharp as ever with 27 points on 10-of-14 shooting, including 7-of-11 from three. Thompson also became the first player in NBA history to drill at least seven threes in back-to-back playoff games, according to Warriors PR on Twitter.
Starting in place of Curry, Shaun Livingston totaled 16 points on an efficient 7-of-8 shooting, while Draymond Green played the role of human Swiss army knife with 15 points, nine rebounds, eight assists and two blocks.
James Harden led all scorers with 35 points (12-of-23 shooting), and Dwight Howard accrued solid counting stats by dropping eight points and grabbing 21 rebounds. However, the Rockets stood no chance as they shot 32.3 percent from the field and 18.8 percent from three as a team.
The Warriors, who appeared determined to deal a knockout blow from the moment the ball was tipped, thrived to the tune of 54.9 percent shooting from the floor and 41.9 percent shooting from beyond the arc.
Although Curry was left to cheer from the bench, the Warriors channeled his explosive capabilities and ran the Rockets off the floor right from the start by firing away from long range and pinballing pinpoint passes on the interior.
The defending champions went on to record their highest-scoring first quarter of the series (37 points), per Warriors PR on Twitter, and they did so despite Harden's stellar start.
The bearded volume scorer opened the proceedings by converting six of his first eight shots en route to scoring 14 of the Rockets' first 16 points, but his teammates couldn't match even a fraction of his effort in the scoring column.
By the time the first quarter came to a close, Houston trailed by 17 points because Harden's supporting cast laid an egg, as ESPN Stats & Info explained:
Harden continued to light it up by posting the highest-scoring first half (25 points on 8-of-12 shooting) of any Rockets player in the series, according to Warriors PR, but all Houston scorers not wearing No. 13 combined to score 12 points and make 5-of-34 shots over the game's first 24 minutes.
Jason Terry—who guaranteed a Game 5 victory, according to the Houston Chronicle's Jonathan Feigen—didn't do anything to help make that declaration become a reality. The 38-year-old opened the proceedings ice-cold, and things didn't improve as he ended the night scoreless while missing all seven of his field-goal attempts.
Terry also may have lit a fire inside Thompson, whose third-quarter sharpshooting exhibition put the Rockets in a 30-point hole entering the fourth quarter, according to USA Today's Sam Amick:
And as The Vertical's Michael Lee noted, it's a good thing Terry didn't commemorate the guarantee with ink a la his 2011 run with the Dallas Mavericks:
With an emphatic victory in hand, the Warriors will have the luxury of sitting back and waiting to find out who their second-round foe will be.
The Portland Trail Blazers are in the driver's seat following a 108-98 Game 5 win Wednesday night at Staples Center, but the Warriors would assuredly prefer to square off against the depleted Los Angeles Clippers in the Western Conference Semifinals.
Not only are the Clippers without Chris Paul (hand) and Blake Griffin (quad), but the Warriors swept the four-game season series against their Pacific Division foes.
The Blazers, on the other hand, dealt Golden State one of its nine regular-season losses when they smashed the opposition by 32 points at Moda Center on Feb. 19.
Now, the Warriors won the other three showdowns against Portland by an average of 20.3 points per game, but traveling to the Pacific Northwest and trying to contain Damian Lillard night after night is a daunting challenge despite the disparity in experience that favors the defending champions.
But even if the Blazers do wind up advancing past the first round for the second time in three seasons, the Warriors will hope they do so in seven games rather than six for one simple reason: Time is Golden State's most valuable asset so long as Curry is sidelined.
Postgame Reaction
Following the win, Thompson discussed his team’s closeout effort with TNT:
However, the mood wasn’t quite as joyful when Houston left the floor.
"For me and for all of us, I hope this was a learning experience," Rockets interim head coach J.B. Bickerstaff said, according to The Undefeated's Marc J. Spears.
Bickerstaff also explained why Howard played well into garbage time after Houston's other starters went to the bench, according to The Vertical's Chris Mannix:
Speaking to reporters in the locker room, Harden broke down what went wrong for the Rockets, as NBA TV documented on Twitter:
Unlike Houston, Golden State benefited from a balanced effort en route to clinching a series victory.
"Literally every single guy on our roster contributed during this series," head coach Steve Kerr said, according to the team’s official Twitter account.
"There was a lot of things said in that locker room," Marreese Speights said, per ESPN.com’s Ethan Strauss. "They guaranteed a win, talked about a long flight back. Only flight back to Houston now is for vacation."
