More Blazers complaints: Terry Stotts says Klay Thompson “was able to push off a little bit” in Game 1
No surprises tonight, as Steph Curry will miss his third consecutive game due to his Grade 1 MCL sprain.
“He’s making the improvement that we’re looking for. But he hasn’t been on the floor with the team at this point. So hopefully that’ll come. We don’t know when, though,” said Kerr, who was asked if getting three days off after Game 2 could give Curry enough recovery time to play in Game 3.
“The training staff will just tell me (how Curry is doing) each day. There is a nice gap in there and it’d be great if he made enough progress to get on the floor with the team. We’ll just wait and see.”
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In the first round, a Rockets fan blog pushed the idea that the Warriors get open due to the illegal screens they set. In the second round, a similar conversation was reignited by the player tasked with guarding Klay Thompson.
“They set a lot of illegal screens,” Blazers guard C.J. McCollum said Tuesday. “They are moving and stuff. That’s the respect you get when you are champions, you get a lot more respect from the referees. You have to figure out a way to get around those screens and make it difficult.”
Portland head coach Terry Stotts was asked about his shooting guard’s assessment, and he agreed.
“Um, you know, there’s a little movement,” Stotts said with a smile. “I think Andrew would probably admit to that.”
Meanwhile, Kerr is totally over the whole thing.
“I don’t really have a comment on it. Everybody sets moving screens.”
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The Blazers can complain all they like, but if they don’t figure out a way to stop Thompson, this is not going to be a long series.
When Stotts was asked after Game 1 whether they might need to make an adjustment against Thompson, he was a little vague.
“We’ll watch the film and see if we can make any changes,” he said.
During Stott’s pregame press conference tonight, I asked him whether his film study showed him that they needed to make a change. For example, putting a bigger player (Al-Farouq Aminu?) on Thompson.
“I think we have to be open to it, but I thought C.J. — it’s hard to say, guy got 18 in the first quarter — but I thought most of his shots were contested. I thought C.J. made him move around,” said Stotts, who went on to mention another unfair advantage the Warriors received in Game 1.
“The fact that he was able to push off a little bit and get some separation, you know, helped him get cleaner looks. But I think at this stage you have to be open to making changes and we’ll see how the game evolves.”
