San Francisco – Jordan Poole scored 29 points, his late surge in the fourth was not enough to defeat the Los Angeles Lakers who were without their star player, LeBron James. Tonight’s 19-103 loss to LA snapped the Warriors four game home-winning streak. Another frustrating loss put the Warriors back at .500.
“I think our guys are frustrated,” said Golden State head coach Steve Kerr. “We’ve had so many close losses and we’re right up against the All-Star break, I think our guys like everybody around the league, they need a break, but they’re frustrated that we couldn’t close out these last two games and we just haven’t been able to string together enough wins to kind of create a little momentum and some separation in the standings So our guys are definitely frustrated, but we’ll keep going. We’ve got to just keep fighting, keep competing and we’ll see. where it all goes.”
Poole led all scores, his 17 fourth quarter points are the most he has scored in the games’s final frame. Draymond Green tallied his ninth double-double on the season. Tonight marked his 10th game with double-figure assists and 18th game scoring 10-or-more points. The Warriors fell to 2-22 this season when their opponent outshoots them from the field (Lakers outshot them, 44.9 to 41.7 percent tonight).
“I think when you are losing games and you are .500, and you are not a .500 losing team it gets frustrating, but no one is going to feel sorry for you,” Green said. “No one is going to feel sorry for us. It is what it is. You have to keep fighting and dig yourself out of it and find a way.
“Number one, it starts defensively. It was tie game and I think that they went up eight (points) and five of the points were just off Rui (Hachimura) getting loose balls, or someone getting loose balls and getting it to Rui and he hit a couple of shots. That is one thing. When you are down guys, you have to get 50/50 balls, you have to make those plays. We didn’t do a good job of that.”
Golden State is now 0-7 this season when scoring 105 points-or-fewer. LA evened the regular season series at 1-1, with the next matchup on February 23 at Crypto.com Arena. Prior to tonight’s matchup, the Warriors had won the last two meetings against the Lakers overall and the last three in the Bay Area. Golden State recorded 31 assists for its league-leading 31st 30-assist game of the season.
Up Next: The Warriors host the Washington Wizards on Monday, February 13 at 7 p.m. PT.
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No new updates on Gary Payton II
San Francisco – The anticipation of the Gary Payton II trade that included a four-team deal will have to wait until the deadline tomorrow at 6:30pm PST. Golden State must decide on keeping Payton or passing on him which will kill the trade that also sent James Wiseman to the Detroit Pistons. Payton failed his physical and by league rule the Portland Trailblazers must inform the Warriors of any injuries prior to the trade, they did not.
Steve Kerr again had no answers for the media for his pregame press conference today.
Golden State host the Los Angeles Lakers tonight, LeBron James will sit out his second game since breaking the NBA all-time scoring record at 38,390 passing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar who set the record 40 years ago.
Klay Thompson takes the floor with his pregame warmup.
