Draymond Green unleashes his fire — something the Warriors desperately need
Golden State Warriors need playoff version of Draymond Green now

>Golden State Warriors forward Draymond Green (23) reacts after
blocking a pass to New Orleans Pelicans’ Herbert Jones (5) from the
sideline in the second half of their NBA game at Chase Center in San
Francisco, Calif., on Tuesday, March 28, 2023. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News
Group)
By SHAYNA RUBIN | srubin@bayareanewsgroup.com | Bay Area News Group
PUBLISHED: March 30, 2023 at 5:23 a.m. | UPDATED: March 30, 2023 at
10:20 a.m.
https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/03/30/draymond-green-unleashes-his-fire-something-the-warriors-desperately-need/

SAN FRANCISCO — There’s nothing more unrelenting than a Warriors’
3-point shooting avalanche, and often an amped-up Draymond Green’s voice
triggers the cascade. So when Green starts talking — loud — teammates
who know him best know it’s time to lock in.

Teammates also know Green typically saves that voice for the playoffs.
But in a crucial game Tuesday night, with only a handful of games left
to pull themselves out of the postseason play-in and into a first-round
series guarantee, Green let loose.

Once longtime foe CJ McCollum ticked him off, Green was in everyone’s
ear and in their face. He drew a technical foul, a Flagrant 1 and was a
team-high plus-26 as the Warriors overcame a 20-point deficit in the
second half to win 120-109.

“Draymond willed us to victory,” coach Steve Kerr said after the game.
“His intensity, his frustration with the way we were playing. Mad at the
world, yelling at everybody. Our bench, their bench, me. Frankly, we all
deserved it.”

To be clear, Kerr was “liking it, a lot.”

At various points this year Green has pleaded with his team to show a
little grit and intensity, things he considers paramount to success.
Demands for a little fire might not have come off great from Green in
particular after the Jordan Poole punch debacle. Early this season,
Green’s teammates thought he was holding back a bit because of the
preseason disaster. But telling by Kerr’s postgame grin, Green is
feeling like himself.

“This is the first time I’ve seen him get like that this year,” Kevon
Looney said. “It happened a few times during the playoffs last year. (In
the NBA) Finals, Memphis series it happened a couple times. During the
regular season, he usually doesn’t get like that. This time of year,
it’s different because every game is like a playoff game. He usually
saves that for the playoffs when it’s time to win.”

Newer teammate Donte DiVincenzo hadn’t seen Green go full red until
Tuesday, but he was in the thick of the drama. It started with Green’s
hard foul on Brandon Ingram that garnered a technical foul, a flagrant
and a scuffle that had McCollum chirping at Green and Steph Curry.
DiVincenzo got dragged into the beef, getting up into McCollum’s face
after McCollum ran into him while chasing after Klay Thompson.

At that point, Green had the entire team “riding with him.” And they
knew before the fouls, before McCollum decided to stir the pot, that an
amped Green was brewing.

“I don’t think it took much, to be honest with you,” DiVincenzo said.
“But he has his own history with CJ in Portland, but I think he saw
where the game was going for us and everybody’s head. That’s what he
does as a leader, sometimes he takes the bullet for everybody else.
That’s what he was going for tonight.”

Said Looney: “They were trying to get under his skin, but he was already
telling us we have to go, amping us up, we’re going to win this game.
The fire started and we followed from there.”

Curry isn’t a big talker, but he feeds off Green’s words and dug into
the re-hashing of an old Trail Blazers rivalry. Curry sought out the
McCollum defensive match-up down the stretch, his 22 second-half points
fueling a 74-point half for the team.

“(Curry) likes to see his guys get going,” Looney said.

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For the Warriors, every loss feels like they beat themselves. After all
these years, they know they can avoid collapse by demoralizing opposing
teams — sometimes it takes that extra Green edge to do it. Green, too,
is fighting through plenty of aches and bruises that only adrenaline can
mask.

“For me, I don’t know if everyone thought that because not everyone has
been in a situation like that before,” Looney said. “But, yeah. I know
when he gets going like that I know how Steph will respond, how Klay
will respond and what Jordan (Poole) will do. So I make sure I do my
job. We had confidence going into the locker room we were going to win
the game, down 17. That’s nothing.”

Or, put simply by DiVincenzo: “He lit a spark under our ass, that’s what
everybody needed.”

--
Shayna Rubin | General Assignment Sports Reporter
Shayna Rubin is a Bay Area News Group sports reporter for The Mercury
News and East Bay Times. She covered the Oakland A's from 2019 to 2021
and, most recently, the Golden State Warriors' championship run in 2022.
Shayna is a San Francisco native. She is a graduate of San Francisco
State University with a BA degree in journalism and a MA degree in
broadcasting and electronic communication arts.