The Golden State Warriors should not win Game 5 of the 2019 NBA Finals.
In a rational universe, where teams wiped out by injuries succumb to the natural order and lose, the team seeking a third-straight championship and fourth title in five years sees things differently.
But the Warriors plan to use their minds to will their bodies, through pain, toward victory. The team has embraced an amplified ‘mind over matter’ ethos and it is readily apparent that they have zero doubt in their ability to win not only Game 5 but the whole series.
Here’s how each injured player is harnessing inner strength to overcome perhaps the Warriors’ biggest challenge yet:
Literal Warriors
First: Klay Thompson is digging deep
Klay Thompson is digging deep
After sitting Game 3 with a hamstring strain, Klay Thompson emerged in Game 4 for a team-high 28 points in 42 minutes. If the bad hammy was bothering him, Thompson did a fine job of hiding it — using his mind powers to focus solely on the task at hand. Perhaps if this was a regular-season game against a below-.500 team, however, Thompson would miss time. But because it’s the Finals, the rules apparently have changed.
In an interview with ESPN’s Nick Friedell, Thompson said of his injury:
It didn’t affect me. Like I said before, it’s the Finals. It’s a long season. You play 100-plus games, you’re going to be banged up. But you just got to dig deep. No one’s going to feel sorry for you, so you just got to go out there, man up and play to the best of your ability.
Next: Kevon Looney is mentally blocking the pain
Kevon Looney is mentally blocking the pain
The backup big man missed a game after going down hard in Game 2 resulting in cracked cartilage in his collar bone. Initial reports ruled Looney out for the season. But subsequent reports — based on further medical examination and at least one second opinion that assured the team’s medical staff that Looney would not suffer more damage to the injury — Looney appeared in Game 4 and contributed 10 points and six rebounds.
Looney told Friedell of his Game 4 experience:
It was pretty tough. The first half it was pretty good. The adrenaline was going. Little sore in the fourth. You’ve just got to block it out and do your job.
In conversation with Mark Medina of The Mercury News, Looney admits the pain was excruciating the first day after the injury, but lessened with icing and other treatment:
Definitely after the first day I was hurting a lot. But after that, I got a lot of treatment and got a lot of ice and … I was getting better. I should be able to play and keep it safe and as long as I don’t hurt myself anymore.
Once they gave me the heads up I wouldn’t further make the injury worse, I knew I was going to be able to play and go out and make a contribution.
Hopefully Looney will be even better prior to Game 5 tipoff.
Next: DeMarcus Cousins refuses to go out without a fight
DeMarcus Cousins refuses to go out without a fight
When a person works his entire life for a chance at NBA stardom, toils for nine years on under-performing teams that never made it to the postseason, ruptures his Achilles and misses more than a year, gets into a stride with a championship-winning team after missing out on a big free agency payday because of the injury, makes it to the first playoff game of his career and goes down in the early minutes of Game 2 in the first round with a torn quad, human nature would spiral most into defeat.
DeMarcus Cousins is no different.
In an interview with Rachel Nichols on “The Jump,” the big man said, “I was just ready to quit — throw in the towel.”
He questioned why this was happening to him again:
What did I do wrong? Why do I deserve this?
But the Warriors medical staff provided Cousins with a glimmer of hope for a return in time for the Finals. To get back on the court, Cousins did “the tedious work” of rehab, which also forced him to trust in the medical staff even when he didn’t feel the physical therapy assigned to him was making much improvement.
“The physical part wasn’t the hard part,” Cousins told Nichols. “The hard part is the mental [challenge] that comes with it.”
That faith in the trainers, and in himself, paid off. But to even muster the gumption to try to get back to the court for the Finals, Cousins said he had to “dig deep” and “do some soul-searching.”
That soul-searching took him to his past. “I’ve been doubted my whole life,” Cousins said.
And that was enough to make him give his all to get back on the court, saying he will “not give up without a fight” and if he goes down he will “go down swinging.”
Although Cousins made a big impact in Game 2 of the Finals, he increasingly has struggled as the series has moved along. The Warriors will need a Game 2-like performance from Cousins to get past the hungry Raptors.
Next: Kevin Durant keeps out of the public eye
Kevin Durant keeps out of the public eye
The back-to-back Finals MVP hasn’t spent much time in front of the camera lately. He also hasn’t played since May 8 when he went down with a calf strain against the the Houston Rockets in the second round. Following reports that he was nowhere near ready to play in a Finals game based on struggles in a scrimmage on Thursday, reporters have stated Monday that Durant will be “full go” for tonight’s Game 5 matchup.
The Warriors, meanwhile, are holding his status as “questionable.”
Teammate Andre Iguodala told Anthony Slater of The Athletic that he only wants Durant to return if he can do so safely without causing further damage:
I just want him to be in a good place. If he’s capable and goes out there with confidence, (then do it). But if he’s not, why try to prove anything to anyone else and try to sacrifice your body when it’s not in a place to do that?
Next: Steve Kerr calls them ‘warriors’ — no pun intended
Steve Kerr calls them ‘warriors’ — no pun intended
Warriors coach Steve Kerr is amazed by the performances his players have been able to put together despite serious injuries that would have kept them out of regular-season games. The zen, mind-over-matter mentality trickles down from the Warriors’ fearless leader, Kerr, and he clearly likes what he’s seeing in terms of determination and resolve.
Said Kerr after Game 4:
Klay was amazing. With a tweaked hamstring, to do what he did. Looney as well, coming in and playing 20 minutes, given his injury status. So both those guys are — they’re warriors. No pun intended. They just compete, compete, compete, and I’m really proud of both of them. Both played really well, but again, it wasn’t enough in terms of our team effort.
Their bodies may be bruised and battered, at risk of breaking down completely. But even this is not preventing the Warriors from willing their minds over the pain for another chance at victory.
Game 5 tips off from Scotiabank Arena in Toronto at 9:00 p.m. ET (on ABC).
