Top Moments from Golden State Warriors' 2016-17 Championship Season

For some, a direct line ran between last summer's courtship of Kevin Durant and Monday night's celebration of a second NBA title in three years.

But winning the NBA Finals is never a formality. And the Golden State Warriors' path to a championship ending was far from linear.

Sure, there were far more peaks than valleys, but a string of various high notes—and a critical low one—helped define this hike to history. So much went into making this a special ride that events such as Durant's recruitment, his later injury (and Stephen Curry's subsequent response) and Steve Kerr's surprise return in the NBA Finals couldn't crack the list.

What did make the cut, though, were mostly snapshots of the group's elite abilities, of which there were plenty. Our top 10 are listed here and ordered chronologically.

Opening-Night Humbling

Ben Margot/Associated Press

Expectations reached ridiculous heights between last year's Finals loss and this season's opening tip. With Durant in tow and the most critical components of the 73-win machine still around, hoop minds were resetting the limits of possibilities.

Might 74-plus victories be on the table? No one could write it off, even as everyone around the Warriors downplayed the idea.

There was something therapeutic, then, about Golden State's opening-night 29-point loss to the San Antonio Spurs. For months, the Warriors heard speculation over whether they were the greatest thing to ever happen to basketball. For those 48 minutes, they were reminded that even preposterous on-paper talent carries no on-court guarantees.

"It was a slap in the face," Durant said, per Bay Area News Group's Anthony Slater. "Woke us up a bit."

If that didn't send the message, a 20-point drubbing at the hands of the lowly Los Angeles Lakers less than two weeks later surely did. Ability alone wasn't going to be enough. Golden State had to grow organically like everyone else, and that early adversity helped build the bonds that would yield basketball bliss.

Chef Curry Nets a Baker's Dozen

Tennis balls are jealous of the way Curry bounced back agains the New Orleans Pelicans on Nov. 7. During his previous outing, he'd snapped his record-setting streak of 157 consecutive games with a triple, posting a gruesome 0-of-10 line outside.

Not one to let a bad taste linger—his wife does host a cooking show, after all—he drilled his first perimeter attempt against the Pelicans from 30 feet. He added two more triples in the opening stanza, then three more over a 71-second span of the second quarter.

He opened the second half with a 26-foot splash, closed the third with a 25-footer and sandwiched two other long-range looks in between. His final flurry unleashed three more triples again in 71 seconds, giving him an NBA-record 13 makes on just 17 attempts.

"I don't overreact to games like that whether I go 0-for-10 or 2-for-12 or whatever it is," Curry said, per Janie McCauley of the Associated Press. "My process is the same, but I had another level of focus the last two days trying to get my rhythm back and see the ball go in."

Despite shooting only 3-of-9 inside the arc, Curry finished with a season-high 46 points and tightened his stranglehold on the title of best shooter ever.

Dime-Dropping at Its Finest

There are offensive eruptions, there are video game outbursts and then there's the wizardry the Warriors enacted against the Lakers—in their first meeting after the 20-point loss, mind you—on Nov. 23.

Golden State morphed into an efficiency machine, setting the league's season high for points scored (149) while shooting 61.6 percent from the field and 52.8 percent from outside. But human-torch shooting or insane point totals (only four Warriors reached double figures) didn't define this night. Rather, this was a museum-quality ball-moving masterpiece.

Golden State dished out a franchise-record and season-best 47 assists, falling just six shy of the NBA's all-time mark. No other team had more than 40 this year, and no one had tallied this many since 1991. The Warriors recorded 53 field goals in the contest, meaning 88.7 percent were assisted. Draymond Green tallied a game-high 11 assists (and zero turnovers) in fewer than 28 minutes.

It was only the 15th regular-season game the revamped roster had played together.

"That's pretty crazy," Durant told reporters. "We almost have more assists than rebounds. That's sick. That shows we're getting more comfortable with each other."

Klay Drops 60 in Fewer Than 30

Klay Thompson doesn't subscribe to the theory that sequels can't be as good as the originals. His 60-point scorching of the Indiana Pacers on Dec. 5 was every bit as mind-boggling as last season's fire-breathing 37-point quarter.

This wasn't just a 60-point eruption—you know, because you see those every day. This was the quickest 60-point explosion ever seen at this level. He didn't play the fourth quarter or even finish the third, logging just 29 minutes. That's the fewest ever played by a 60-point scorer, per the Elias Sports Bureau (via ESPN Stats & Information). He dribbled 11 times and possessed the ball for only 90 seconds.

"That's a feat that I would put money on to probably never be touched again in the history of basketball. It's unbelievable," Curry said, per Ethan Sherwood Strauss, then with ESPN.com.

Usually, a 60-point performance elicits a simple response—Wow! (Or maybe something less safe for work.) But this was different. It was hard not to come away with questions of what could have been, given the incredible pace he set.

Statistically speaking, Thompson's scoring was Wilt Chamberlain-esque. Thompson tallied 2.07 points per minute—Wilt Chamberlain had 2.08 points per minute on the night he reached the century mark, per ESPN. In other words, Thompson's searing displays are hoops history in the making.

The Sweet Taste of 35-Point Revenge

Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports

For a championship-or-bust juggernaut such as Golden State, must-win games don't exist before June. However, the Jan. 16 collision with the Cleveland Cavaliers at least qualified as a damn-this-would-be-nice-to-win game.

Dating back to last year's Finals, the Dubs had dropped four straight in the series, including a Christmas collapse in which they squandered a double-digit lead in the final frame. They needed to show more consistent effort and regain some confidence against their rivals.

Golden State embraced a sense of urgency and stormed out to early leads of 7-0, 24-14 and, by the first quarter's end, 37-22. The Warriors won the second period 41-27 and, perhaps for bragging rights, the fourth 31-20. All told, it was a 126-91 shellacking, with Curry, Durant and Thompson outscoring their Big Three counterparts 67-40.

"They beat us four straight times, and that's never fun when a team has your number for four games, so it felt good to redeem ourselves," Thompson told reporters.

As an added bonus, the victory helped the Warriors continue their three-year streak of defeating all 29 other teams in the same season.

Closing the Clippers Rivalry

It's getting harder to remember, but at one point the Los Angeles Clippers stood as arguably the Warriors' biggest rivals. The pair ostensibly battled for control of the Pacific Division, although the second-place finisher hasn't come closer than six games during their shared five-year run atop the standings.

The Warriors are struggling to spot the Clippers in their rearview mirror, as the gap between them grew comically wide this year. Golden State took all four games of the regular-season series—extending its winning streak to 10 in this matchup—by an average of 21.5 points per game.

Their clash on Jan. 28 inflated that figure. The Warriors embarrassed their counterparts by an astounding count of 144-98, thanks in no small part to Curry. It was a cheat-code-enabled kind of night for the two-time MVP, who tallied 43 points on 65.2 percent shooting, closed the second quarter with a half-court swish and outscored LA 25-23 in the third period.

"Warriors again proving they are the best front-running team in NBA history," Tim Bontemps of the Washington Post tweeted during the game. "When they get into clear air space, they take off in a hurry."

Durant and Thompson combined for 39 points and just six missed shots. James Michael McAdoo's 10 points were topped by only two Clippers. The rout was ridiculous enough to keep a different Dubs-Clippers moment off this list—Golden State's 50-point quarter in the clubs' final meeting of the campaign.

Four-Point Brilliance

The phrase "Draymond being Draymond" can paint a thousand mental pictures. But it might be best defined by his unique effort during the Dubs' 122-107 win over the Memphis Grizzlies on Feb. 10.

"That's as dominant of a performance as I've ever seen from somebody who scored four points," Warriors head coach Steve Kerr said, per the Associated Press.

Only Green could crack this list with a night when he went 2-of-6 from the field and 0-of-3 outside en route to a measly four points. But the Swiss army knife sizzled in every other category, leading the Warriors in rebounds (11) and pacing all players in assists (10), steals (10) and blocks (five). It was the league's first triple-double without double-digit points.

Green, who splits his time between power forward and center, missed matching the single-game steals record by one. He almost had his second "5x5" game but fell a point shy—a category that would only trouble a superglue guy like him.

Any arguments against his All-Star credentials should forever be rebuffed with this film.

Western Conference Playoff Sprint

Eric Gay/Associated Press

A Finals berth always felt like a formality, and the Warriors made it such with three consecutive sweeps on the Western Conference side of the playoff bracket. Still, the on-paper strength of this squad—and the injuries that beset some of its postseason combatants—shouldn't diminish the significance of the feat.

No team had ever opened with a perfect 12-0 mark. The Warriors did it. No team had ever swept three best-of-seven series in a single playoffs. The Warriors did it.

"It's a huge accomplishment, and I tip my hat off to all of our players; our coaching staff was phenomenal," Warriors acting coach Mike Brown said, per ESPN.com's Chris Haynes.

The dominance was otherworldly. Of the 12 victories, two were decided by single digits, while four were blowouts of 25-plus points. Golden State won its three closeout contests by an average of 21.7 points, building insurmountable first-quarter advantages of 23, 22 and 12 points.

The lone blemish in Game 4 of the Finals spoiled the Warriors' hope for history, but that three-round run remains unprecedented.

KD's Dagger

Nothing about the Finals fazed Durant—not the five-year gap between visits, not the rematch with his onetime rap collaborator. That was never more evident than on Durant's cold-blooded dagger to stun the Cavs and complete the Warriors' Game 3 comeback.  

It took an absurd amount of courage just to pull the trigger. The optics are awful if a quick-fire three misses its mark in the final minute, on the road, with the scoreboard favoring the other team. That LeBron James, a freakishly athletic six-time All-Defensive selection, was right in his path only added to the difficulty.

But as soon as the ball escaped Durant's fingertips, there was no doubt. The form was beautiful, the followthrough was bold and the net looked like it was designed to catch that shot.

"You can tell, he knows this is his moment," Kerr said, per USA Today's Jeff Zillgitt. "He's been an amazing player in this league for a long time, and I think ... he senses this is his time, his moment, his team."

The Warriors scored the game's final 11 points to escape with a 118-113 victory, and Durant had a personal 7-0 spurt within that run. His night ended with 31 points on 55.6 percent shooting, nine rebounds, four assists, one steal, one block and one long ball for the ages.

Oracle's Long-Awaited Clincher

Jesse D. Garrabrant/Getty Images

The first clincher in Oakland wasn't as scripted. The Cavs proved as pesky as ever for foreseeable reasons (67 points, 14 assists between James and Kyrie Irving) and some surprising ones (40 points on 19 shots for JR Smith and Tristan Thompson). It took time for the Warriors to grease their jump-shooting gears, and even then Green and Klay Thompson shot just 7-of-23 combined.

But the MVP coalition played as advertised in Golden State's series-ending 129-120 win. Durant, who earned Finals MVP honors, had 39 points on 14-of-20 shooting (5-of-8 outside), seven rebounds and five assists. Curry tallied 34 points, 10 assists, six boards and three steals.

"It's kinda crazy to think about the conversations we had this summer and going into the year about how we could both mesh and jell and do what we do and be the players that we are," Curry told reporters. "To see it come to life in this series was unbelievable. We're obviously just getting started."

For all the Dubs' dominance, they're only laying the foundation. There are multiple avenues to internal improvement, whether it's improving chemistry between the featured players or maturation of the youngsters. And collecting complementary external pieces shouldn't be difficult given their championship pedigree and seemingly infectious style of play.

Statistics used courtesy of NBA.com and Basketball Reference.

Zach Buckley covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter: @ZachBuckleyNBA.