Warriors' Game 3 goal: Pick up the pace

OAKLAND - Kevin Durant can't beat the Houston Rockets by himself.

The Warriors need Stephen Curry or Klay Thompson to play well in Game 3 of the Western Conference final. Or both of them.

In Game 1, Curry and Thompson combined to shoot 17 of 33 from the field (52 percent), and scored 46 points. The Warriors won that game by 13 points. In Game 2, Curry and Thompson combined to shoot 10 of 30 (30 percent), and scored only 24 points. The Warriors lost that game by 22.

The Rockets shut down the best-shooting backcourt of all time. That was the difference between Game 1 and Game 2.

“They're just trying to take away open looks,” Thompson said Saturday at the Warriors' practice facility. “I've got to hunt for those open looks and not settle. Just be more aggressive, whether that's making a play for somebody else or getting my own shots. Be more of a threat instead of just standing around.”

Thompson wasn't the only one standing around in Game 2. Most of the Warriors stood around watching as Kevin Durant isolated defenders and took 22 shots.

Is it hard to resist being stationary when Durant isolates?

“Yeah,” Thompson said, “but you have to move off the ball, because that's how you create mismatches and that's how you move the defense. It's something we worked on. I bet the ball movement will be much better (Sunday).”

The issue may not just be the Warriors lack of movement. The issue also may be the Rockets' defense. The Rockets ranked sixth in defensive rating during the regular season, and they specialize in defending screens away from the ball handler. Opponents scored only 0.91 points per possession against the Rockets using off-ball screens - third-lowest in the league.

Meanwhile, the Warriors used off-ball screens on 11.9 percent of their offensive sets - far more than any other team. And the Warriors averaged 1.13 points per possession using off-ball screens, best in the NBA.

The Rockets stop what Golden State does best in the half court.

“They do a ton of switching like we do,” Warriors head coach Steve Kerr said. “And they've got a lot of good-sized guys - Trevor Ariza, P.J. Tucker, Eric Gordon. These guys are solid defenders. They have done a really good job in the half court and the stats show it.”

But they haven't done as well defending the fast break. The stats show that, too. Maybe Kerr was thinking that but didn't say it. The Rockets' defense allowed opponents to score 11.9 fast-break points per game during the regular season, which ranked 16th out of 30 teams. Ordinary.

The Warriors' offense scored a league-high 19.3 fast-break points per game before the playoffs, and scored 18 fast-break points against the Rockets in Game 1. Fantastic. But in Game 2, the Warriors scored only seven points in transition. They became a plodding, half-court isolation offense.

That could change Sunday night at Oracle Arena. “Playing at home helps everyone,” Kerr said. “We play with more pace, our crowd gets into it more. I would guess more of our big, huge runs come at home than on the road.

“We've got to play with more pace. In general, we're at our best when we're running out in transition and getting Klay open looks from the 3-point line.”

How will the Warriors play with more pace in Game 3?

“Play defense,” Kerr said bluntly. “When you're taking the ball out of the net, you're going to end up with more isos. If we defend, we get stops and then we get out in transition. Those are the easiest 3s anybody gets - transition 3s. You can get a couple offensive rebounds and kick them out. That opens up shooters as well. But there's no magic play that we're going to come up with. We're not changing a whole lot in terms of what we do.”

Kerr's equation is elementary: Better defense leads to better looks for Thompson and Curry, which leads to less dependence on Durant alone.

“We got diced up on the defensive end,” Draymond Green said of Game 2, when the Warriors gave up 127 points. “Game 1, we felt threatened, we came out with a sense of urgency. Game 2, we maybe didn't feel as threatened, and the sense of urgency wasn't there. I think you're allowed one of those a series. We got our one. It's time to lock in for the rest of the series.”

And it's time for Thompson and Curry to be themselves. Especially Curry. He's averaging only 17 points per game and shooting just 15.4 percent on 3s in the Western Conference final. So un-Curry.

“I'm not worried,” Thompson said about Curry. “Once he makes a couple, he can make every shot in the book. We have to do a better job as a team to help him get open looks.”

Green disagreed. “We can't help Steph get going,” he said. “Steph is going to help himself. He doesn't need any of us to create looks for him. He's going to do that. We know he will.”

One way or another, Curry and Thompson need to take the pressure off Durant.