It would be Stephen Curry’s fourth NBA championship, or Jayson Tatum’s first. It would be a turn-of-the-century story for Klay Thompson, or a fairy-tale ending for the debut of head coach Ime Udoka for the first time.
There’s a lot at stake in the 2022 NBA Finals for Golden State and the Boston Celtics, two teams with something to prove. For Golden State, it is an opportunity to challenge the odds of reviving a dynasty after two seasons away from the spotlight. For Boston and its rising star formation, here it is, as they say, when legends are made.
Here’s a look at what to expect in the NBA Finals, which begin Thursday in San Francisco.
Third-seeded Golden State has a home advantage over second-seeded Boston because of his best regular-season record.
Maybe the experience is not everything.
After the Boston Celtics won the 7th game of the Eastern Conference Finals, his words about facing Golden State in the NBA Finals conveyed a mixture of confidence and deference.
“We know we will face a great team with the Warriors. Great players, great organization, “said Celtics baseman Marcus Smart.” They have the track record to prove it. They know exactly what it takes. They’ve been here. They’re veterinarians. ready for the challenge “.
These finals are marked by a lack of experience, with a well-experienced team in the basketball championship and another full of newcomers to this stage. Golden State has five players who have participated in several finals: Stephen Curry, Draymond Green, Klay Thompson, Kevon Looney and Andre Iguodala. The Celtics have no players who have come this far.
Part of that is a function of age. The Boston list is full of players in their 20s, while Golden State is a 30-year-old group whose lives have changed since their first appearances in the finals.
“Just being able to balance even family life,” Curry said after Game 5 of the Western Conference Finals. “I’m lucky to have kids who are now 9, 6 and 3 years old. Like when I came back in ’14, ’15, chasing those playoffs, just a different environment in terms of everything that happens in life.”
Smart was a 21-year-old in 2015, the first time Curry, Green and Thompson had won an NBA championship. Jayson Tatum, who was named the most valuable player in this year’s Eastern Conference Finals, was in 11th grade. His teammate Jaylen Brown had just finished high school and was going to play college basketball at the University of California, Berkeley, just 11 miles from where Golden State was playing at the time.
In the 2015 championship, with the exception of Looney, whom the Warriors drafted a few weeks after winning the title, participants in the Golden State return final had gone through years of season and early playoff outings.
The Celtics 2021-22 have also spent the last few years learning to win the playoffs and facing the bitterness of losing. Boston has been in the playoffs every year since 2015 and reached the conference finals four times.
But the Golden State trip proves that the end experience is not everything.
When the Warriors won the 2015 championship, they faced a Cleveland Cavaliers team led by LeBron James. James was making his fifth consecutive appearance in the final and sixth in the overall. But he couldn’t stop Golden State from winning the series in six games.
But James was also relatively new to this team. The depth of the Golden State experience will help lead the team this month.
Prediction: Golden State in six.
Draymond Green is Golden State’s “emotional leader.”
Stephen Curry has drained more triples than anyone in history. Klay Thompson is still enjoying his triumphant return from two cataclysmic injuries. And Jordan Poole, out of the swamp of the two seasons of Golden State in dynastic pause, has become one of the most dynamic young scorers in the league.
When the Warriors return to the NBA Finals, several players have fueled their careers. But in the midst of all the pyrotechnics of the team, is it possible that Draymond Green, the team’s spokesman, very thoughtful and tormenting of the referee, is being overlooked? Okay, maybe not. But in his tenth season, Green is making his sixth trip to the finals, and it’s no coincidence. He is the defensive force and the first pass that unites his teammates in more ways than one.
“Our emotional leader,” coach Steve Kerr said.
And Green has rarely, if ever, played better in basketball than in this postseason. In Golden State’s final win over the Dallas Mavericks in the Western Conference Finals, he racked up 17 points, 9 assists and 6 rebounds while shooting 6 of 7 from the field. He made the quarterback attack. It was a defensive threat. He used five of the six personal fouls.
He also avoided participating in many of the extracurriculars that had hindered him in the past, at least until after the game, when he talked about facing the Celtics with a championship in play. The problem was that the Celtics were still playing with the Miami Heat in the Eastern Conference Finals. In fact, the Heat would force a game 7 before falling short. But in Green’s mind, he was never wrong.
“I thought they were the best team and obviously it wasn’t far behind,” Green told KGMZ-FM in San Francisco this week, Golden State radio broadcast partner.
In his own way, Green was a source of stability for the organization, as the team worked with injuries in recent seasons. He mentored his younger peers. He was wearing a uniform when Curry and Thompson were away. He acknowledged that it wasn’t always easy: he was used to competing in championships, and suddenly Golden State had the worst record in the league.
Now, alongside Curry and Thompson, Green has another title in sight.
“I can’t say I would have thought of this season, like,‘ Hey, we’re going to win a championship, ’or‘ We’re going to be in the NBA Finals, ’” Green said. “But I always believed with the three of us that we had a chance.”
Prediction: More rested and more experienced, Golden State wins the series in six games.
Both are great on defense, but different on offense.
The connections between Celtics coach Ime Udoka and Golden State coach Steve Kerr, both former NBA role-playing players, are numerous. Both led their teams to the finals in their early seasons as head coach, Kerr in 2014-15, when Golden State won the championship, and Udoka that year.
They are also connected with San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich. Udoka was a Spurs assistant from 2012 to 2019, which resulted in a championship in 2014. Udoka also played three seasons with the Spurs, while Kerr played four seasons in San Antonio and won two championships. Both also worked with Popovich on the U.S. men’s basketball team.
Popovich’s influence is clear. Udoka and Kerr have preached the value of a firm defense. Boston and Golden State were the two best defensive teams in the NBA during the regular season. And like Popovich, coaches are willing to openly criticize players publicly.
Where they diverge is offensively.
Udoka has installed a methodical and slower offensive. The Celtics often secluded themselves, standing near the top of the NBA during the regular season, while Golden State was near the bottom.
In part, that comes down to the staff: Boston’s top two players, Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown, are adept at getting to the edge and breaking down one-on-one defenses, but less so when it comes to passing. Also, the Celtics start with Marcus Smart as a base, and it’s not a traditional defense.
Kerr, meanwhile, has long preached an equal ball-based offensive offensive, so much so that Kevin Durant, after leaving Golden State for the Nets in 2019, complained that the offense of Kerr had been limiting. This season, Golden State led the NBA in scoring cuts in the basket, while the Celtics were around the league average. Golden State was also second in the league in total passes.
There is another difference as well. Kerr is more willing to experiment with lineups. He has given significant minutes to rookies like Moses Moody and Jonathan Kuminga, shuffling them in and out of the rotation. In the playoffs, Kerr gave the 19-year-old Kuminga three starts in the semifinals against the Memphis Grizzlies. Moody, 20, was in the rotation against the Dallas Mavericks at the conference finals.
Udoka has preferred to keep his fairly predictable rotations, especially in the playoffs, rarely reaching the Celtics bench even in the event of foul problems.
Prediction: Celtics in six. His defense is well designed to chase Stephen Curry.