The Golden State Warriors are facing elimination on Monday night. They trail the Toronto Raptors 3-1 in the NBA Finals and their dreams of a third straight championship are on life support.
Andrew Bogut, who was in Golden State for the 2015 championship run and the 2016 Finals run, knows that counting out the Warriors is a risky proposition. This team has been through hoop wars as a unit, rallying from a 3-1 deficit in the 2016 Western Conference Finals before blowing a 3-1 lead in those same NBA Finals.
Said Bogut of the character of this team:
This group has been though hell and back numerous times — dealing with injuries, dealing with guys in-and-out of lineups, all the media attention we’ve had over the last 12 months has been crazy; we’ve seen everything, so this will be just another cog in that chapter hopefully.
The Warriors have been the most scrutinized team over the past few years. From questions about Stephen Curry’s impact on the game to the hiring of coach Steve Kerr to the controversial signing of Kevin Durant, this team has been involved in a media circus. Yet they have always pushed through the adversity.
Facing this 3-1 deficit will be tough to handle, but if there’s any team to rally from this situation, it’s this one.
Bogut knows the odds are against his team but still has faith:
The odds are against us, no one’s giving us much of a chance because NBA history says this [coming back from 3-1 down] doesn’t happen very often — it actually happened to us three or four years ago — so we think we can still salvage the series, but we kind of have to play three perfect games to beat these guys who are playing really good basketball.
Golden State will attempt the first step of this journey on Monday night at 9:00 p.m. ET from Scotiabank Arena (ABC).
