Quick thoughts:

• I am the only person in California without an HD TV, so I kept having flashbacks every time Bogut and Lee were on the court at the same time. I caught myself thinking, “huh Biedrins is getting some early minutes.” Thank god those are just flashbacks
• Hott damn Klay Thompson. That was impressive even if against a crap Lakers team. 38 points in 3 quarters. I almost wish the game hadn’t been so close so we could have seen how hott he could get, but in the long run I’d rather take a rested Thompson for tonight’s game against the other LA team.
• Iguodala is really hard for my dyslexic brain to spell, but he looked great on defense and that fast break give and take with David Lee was pretty.
• Back to Thompson, once Barnes gets healthy, this interplay between 5th/6th man is going to be interesting. I expect them to get roughly equal minutes, even if the hot hand gets more minutes during a single game. I just cannot decide who fits the 6th man spark-plug role better, but I think it might be Thompson.
• Anytime you can win a game and Steph Curry only score 10 points is a good day.
• I’m a Bazemore fan boi heavily influenced by watching him in Santa Cruz, so it was nice to see him hit a couple of 3s.
• Which one of the Euros becomes the human victory cigar? Should be an epic battle.

In all seriousness, this has been a tremendous 3-game stretch. These aren’t meaningless end-of-season games for the opposition; the Mavericks, Blazers, and Lakers all had a lot to play for when they faced the Warriors this past week.

The last two games in particular have been a ton of fun to watch, as the Warriors — dare I say it — dominated for most of the second half in both contests. Things got a little hairy at the end of the game last night, but the Dubs hit enough big shots to keep a healthy cushion and even avoid a foul-plagued ending.

Perhaps most impressive, the Warriors out-rebounded the Lakers 50-47. Bynum pulled down 17 boards, but they were able to hold Gasol and (especially) Odom in check. David Lee matched Bynum with 17 boards of his own, making it his second straight impressive double-double. Thanks to the rebounding and turnover (+7) margins, the Warriors ended up with 93 shots to the Lakers 77 — a big part of why they won despite shooting just 39%.

Curry and Ellis put on a nice show, as despite Curry’s cold touch early he hit some big shots at the end to preserve the win. Wright had another cold shooting night, but hit two big 3′s late to keep up the lead and break the Warriors’ single-season record for made 3-pointers. Udoh went scoreless, but pulled down 8 rebounds in 19 minutes — impressive considering the front line he was up against.

Now the Warriors get a few nights off before facing the Kings on Sunday, when they can get to the 36-win mark that they decided to shoot for after the bottom fell out after the All Star break. I know the Warriors have developed a habit of getting hot late in the season when their playoff spot is already decided, but they appear locked into the 11th draft position at this point so might as well see what they can do!

David Lee had his finest game as a Warrior, helping the team to a +7 rebounding advantage by pulling down 20 boards to go with 29 points. Monta and Steph also chimed in with 30 and 28, respectively, and as they mentioned on the postgame show this was the best game these three have played together as a trio.

Amundson gave some great second half minutes off the bench — even hitting his free throws — and while Dorell Wright couldn’t hit a shot to save his life, he didn’t screw things up too badly either as he posted a +21.

Now the Warriors head down to LA to take on the Lakers on the back end of a back-to-back. As the great Fitz just mentioned on the telecast, winning tomorrow would complete the most improbably 3-game winning streak…just about ever.

A hearbreaker of a loss, but great to see that this team still has fight left in it. Those back-to-back 3′s at the end of regulation were almost legendary, and had me scaring the hell out of my 4-month-old with my yells. Sadly, they couldn’t recreate the magic at the end of OT, but still a good showing against a playoff team on the road.

Curry brought his A offensive game — as he usually does against the Thunder — though his PG stats (5 assists/6 turnovers) were once again lacking. Monta on the other hand continued his hot streak in terms of distribution, with double-digit assists for the third straight game.

Udoh continued to make his presence felt defensively, and Lee did a good job playing big with 15 boards to go with 24 points (even with Perkins, the Warriors continue to match up inside against the Thunder better than they seemingly do anyone else).

Only Wright disappointed among the starters with a 2-13 shooting night, and he still managed to pull down 10 boards and post a team-high +10. And looking at the overall +/- stats, this game was clearly lost by the bench: all positive for the starters, all double-digit negative for the reserves — only 3 of whom played, totaling just 35 minutes.

Overall, I guess this is the sort of result you want at this point — great effort, but lottery position preserved.

Ellis looked great tonight with 37, 7, and 12, and his 360 layup was truly a thing of beauty. David Lee also brought it with a season-high 33 points to go along with 12 rebounds, and Ekpe played big minutes once against and even managed to snag a very respectable 7 boards.

Curry’s night was mixed, as he was hampered by fouls — yet again — and had just 4 assists to 5 turnovers. The bench was similarly unimpressive, providing just 11 points and only 48 minutes to spell the starters.

Now the competition gets tough again, starting on the road against the Thunder on Tuesday. The Warriors have put a nice little run together against two inferior teams, so once again we get to see if they can build off this sort of momentum and keep it up against quality teams.

Turns out I was probably wrong.  Lee has pretty much the exact same rebounding average in a win as in a loss.  He has slightly more points in a loss but it is not a huge difference (about a point).  Lee is however much more consistent in losses than he is in wins, that can be seen in the more compact boxes.  Look how 10-11 rebounds takes up the entire 50-75% percentile group.  That is pretty damn consistent.  Lee is more likely to have a good rebounding game in a Warriors win (or the Warriors tend to win when Lee has a higher rebounding game) which makes sense.

Nothing earth-shattering but there it is. Maybe I will take a look at some of the other players over the next few days.

On a side note I like the boxplot because there is more information in it than just looking at per game averages home versus away, for example the implied consistency.

UPDATE: In the comments Mike asked for the assists version of this graph.  I don’t think you could have drawn splits that were much similar.

David Lee Assists in wins versus losses

The bigs deserve most of the credit in this one, as they frustrated Kevin Love and his frontline friends on the way to a +41 between Lee, Biedrins, Udoh, and Amundson. They won the rebounding battle against a team that bested them by 21 on that stat in their last meeting, and fueled the Warriors big turnover advantage by making Darko cough up the ball and generating 10 blocks (5 of those for Udoh). And, of course, ending Love’s double-double streak is a nice trophy achievement — one that should go in Lee’s case.

Another thing that stood out about this game was how ugly it was during the Warriors’ run over the 3rd and 4th quarters. It had a slow, plodding pace with a ton of whistles, but for once the Dubs were the beneficiary of ugly ball as they completely flummoxed the Timberwolves’ offense and got plenty on their own offensive end to pull away.

So, good to see a game play out the way it was supposed to, as the Warriors have been a bit lazy about playing up/down to their level of competition this year. But to win consistently you need to beat up on the teams you should, then steal a few against those above you. This was a nice step in that direction — and tonight we’ll see if they can keep it up with a road game against the Kings.

What stands out the most to me are the assist totals — 35 assists, 12 above their season average. Curry had 12, Monta had 11, and David Lee dished out 9. That’s a mark of great ball movement, and suggests that their great shooting was more than just a lucky hot streak.

Throw in an 18-point advantage on points off turnovers, and it was enough to overcome a typically lax rebounding effort (not to mention bad 3-point defense — we very easily could have been focusing on the Magic’s hot shooting from deep).

All in all, a fun win that cleans out a bit of the bad taste from the road trip. They’ll need to string together a few more of these sorts of performances against Magic-level teams in order to change the current verdict on the season, but for now we can at least savor a good win.

Big night from the backcourt, as Monta and Steph combined for 47 points, 14 rebounds, and 13 assists. And check out the +/- that Curry pulled down: +20 in 39 minutes. I can’t remember the last time a Warrior had a number that high.

David Lee had his now customary double-double — you can call his stats hollow, but you can’t completely discount them.

Now it’s on to New Jersey, and something of a freebie as no one will be expecting much from the Dubs on the back end of a back-to-back at the end of their season-long roadie. But this team has surprised in this situation before — in particular, the game at New Orleans — so maybe they’ll come out tomorrow and surprise.