It’s been an interesting, often messy, occasionally affirming season of basketball in the Bay Area. And now, after all the sideways lurches and missteps and injuries and late course corrections, a mere four wins separate the Golden State Warriors from returning to the NBA Finals.
How did they get here? First, they made relatively short work of an out-manned and overmatched Denver Nuggets team playing for pride, and then narrowly survived the fury of the deep and rowdy Memphis Grizzlies. The Warriors have much to be proud of for passing these initial tests. Before the 2021-22 campaign began, a trip to the Western Conference Finals seemed possible but unlikely, and that was before the gaudy start, and before Steph Curry mysteriously lost his shooting touch, and before we saw what Klay Thompson’s up-and-down reintegration looks like in real time.