Golden State's first win of the season tells you a lot about Denver and almost nothing about Golden State. The 134-114 final is a Denver defense that's been broken for two years, catching the Warriors at the right time.
⚡ Upset:Warriors had a 30% chance before tip-off and beat Nuggets 134–114.
Start with what happened. Yaxel Lendeborg, the rookie taken 11th overall out of Michigan, put up 31 points, 12 rebounds and six assists in what appears to have been his fourth appearance of the season. Stephen Curry didn't miss a shot, going 8-for-8 from the floor for 24 points, with 21 of them coming after halftime. That's a special shooting performance, and Lendeborg's line is the kind of breakout that gets a rookie's name moving around the league. Both are real.
What's in dispute is what it means. Denver entered the night 1-1 and fell to 1-2, but the record undersells how specifically broken this team is defensively: the Nuggets have ranked 21st in defense for two seasons running, an anchor on an offense built around a three-time MVP who is otherwise still playing like one. This is who Denver's defense has been all season, and it showed again at Ball Arena. A team can give up 134 points to a rookie and a shooter having the best half of his life and still look fine on offense. The issue is effort and scheme at the rim. Golden State walked into a building with a known leak and got wet.
RatingRatingSome think the Warriors were actually better than 0-3 suggested, that a blown fourth-quarter lead against Memphis and a shorthanded, single-digit loss in a back-to-back against Phoenix paint a picture of a team a possession or two from 3-0 anyway, and that this Denver game is just the sample finally matching the process. There's something to that about the two prior losses specifically. There's nothing to it as an argument about Monday. The real issue through three games was a missing frontcourt: Kristaps Porzingis compromised to the point where retirement is reportedly on the table, and Golden State getting out-rebounded in two of its first three losses. Denver papered over all of that by letting a guard shoot lights-out and a rookie feast on space against a defense that hands out both.
Ask the same question again the first time Golden State runs into a team that can actually defend the interior and doesn't hand out space to shoot from. Until then, the corner everyone wants to declare turned is a Denver defense that was always going to make somebody look good. This time it was Golden State's turn. Lendeborg earned his night, and so did Curry. The roster that's been without a real center for three weeks earned nothing. One box score against a defense that's been bad for two seasons running doesn't change that.
