Kevin Durant's Huge Night Leads Warriors Past Rockets; James Harden Scores 41
The Golden State Warriors and Houston Rockets have been on a collision course all season, and the defending champions landed the first punch in the heavyweight fight.
Golden State seized home-court advantage Monday with a 119-106 victory in Game 1 of the Western Conference Finals at the Toyota Center behind a dominant performance from Kevin Durant.
The reigning NBA Finals MVP torched the Rockets for 37 points and prevailed in a battle with former teammate James Harden. Harden carried Houston with 41 points and seven assists and traded baskets with Durant, but the home team didn't have the overall firepower to keep up with the Warriors.
Klay Thompson added 28 points, while Stephen Curry (18 points, eight assists and six rebounds) and Draymond Green (five points, nine assists and nine boards) stuffed the stat sheet in support of Durant.
As a result, Golden State has a chance to take a commanding 2-0 series lead before heading home in Wednesday's Game 2.
Kevin Durant Crushes Rockets' Soul
Nobody on the Rockets could stop Durant, and he knew it.
He wasted little time establishing himself as the dominant offensive presence on Golden State's side with 13 points in the first quarter, and he continued working in the midrange, attacking any defender off the dribble and unleashing his quick shot.
His silky-smooth moves, along with the fact not even Clint Capela had the length to challenge his jumpers, left Houston's defense desperately searching for answers:
Anytime the Warriors needed someone to bail them out, they simply put the ball in Durant's hands, and he responded as only a pure scoring machine could. While he didn't settle for outside shots and probed off the bounce, he mixed in a trio of threes just for good measure.
He also didn't get caught up in the back-and-forth when Chris Paul yelled at him to stop talking and "play ball" and landed a hard elbow on his backside, as the TNT broadcast captured.
Instead, he focused on ripping Houston's heart out and stealing its home-court advantage.
Splash Brothers Win Best Supporting Actors
Curry and Thompson were each quiet at times while Durant went to work, but they picked their spots to swing the contest.
With Durant carrying the torch, Curry impacted the game in other ways during a third-quarter stretch that saw Golden State's lead balloon to 13 after a halftime deadlock. He assisted on a Thompson three, found Iguodala for a dunk after a steal, scored on a drive and grabbed an offensive rebound.
Elsewhere, it was Thompson who drilled the dagger with under four minutes remaining. His three-pointer stretched a seven-point lead to 10 and quieted the crowd after Houston garnered momentum for a brief moment.
James Harden's Solo Act Falls Short
Harden didn't have any Splash Brothers supporting him in his showdown with Durant:
That doesn't take away from his brilliant performance that saw him consistently use his patented step-back jumper after rocking defenders to sleep on top of the key in isolation sets. Whenever a perimeter defender bit on his head fakes or cheated toward the step-back, he exploded into the lane and scored at the rim.
Harden put Kevon Looney in a blender and specifically targeted Curry in isolations, but there was only so much he could do with Trevor Ariza (eight points) battling foul trouble and P.J. Tucker (one point) going invisible for large portions of the contest.
Paul (23 points and 11 rebounds) was the only other Rocket to score more than 15, as the Rockets offense eventually devolved into Harden pounding the ball and waiting for an ideal switch before attacking.
It worked for a while, but the Warriors' balanced approach proved too overpowering.
Draymond Flirts with Ejection
The Warriors started the Hamptons Five lineup of Durant, Curry, Thompson, Green and Iguodala to make an initial statement, but Green's antics stole the show early.
He received a technical in the first two minutes for shoving Harden, but that didn't stop him from vehemently yelling at the officials on multiple occasions. A second technical would have ended his contest early, but it didn't seem to minimize his passion.
Even Utah Jazz rookie Donovan Mitchell noticed:
As is always the case with Green, he mixed in plenty of impressive play with his emotion, facilitated from the high post, battled for boards and contributed on defense by protecting the rim and picking up Houston's guards in transition.
Best of Luck, Eastern Conference
If there is a big-picture takeaway to Monday's game, it's that the winner of the series between the Cleveland Cavaliers and Boston Celtics is in serious trouble in the NBA Finals.
The Warriors-Rockets battle felt like the de facto NBA Finals with an overwhelming amount of offensive talent on each end going at a breakneck pace for extended stretches against two elite defenses. Houston was sixth in the league in defensive rating and the Warriors were ninth during the regular season, per NBA.com, and even those units were left helpless at times.
Even with LeBron James, that type of talent isn't present in the East.
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