Long before Stephen Curry’s shooting pyrotechnics, before the Warriors completed a tip-to-buzzer victory and indulged in some cathartic postgame revelry, they got what they’ve been wanting and needing for two weeks.
Their first glimpse of Dennis Schröder’s two-way skills.
It appeared Thursday night in the first quarter of Golden State’s 139-105 smashing of the Philadelphia 76ers at Chase Center. It came not when Schröder drained his first 3-pointer barely two minutes after tipoff. Not when he splashed another 58 seconds later. It came when he made a third 3-ball with 1:27 left in the quarter.
The sight of Schröder making three consecutive triples in the first 11 minutes seemed to lift a dark cloud off the offense. It took seven games and 34 attempts for him to make his first seven 3-pointers as a Warrior, and now he’s 3-of-3 in his first seven minutes in his eighth game.
Schröder neither exhaled nor exulted. Not demonstrably, at least. But his shoulders surely felt a lightness he’d not known since joining the Warriors on Dec. 15.
“The last 10 days, 12 days have been tough,” Schröder said in his postgame interview. “But luckily, we won the game today. Played very well, shared the ball, played with force. We stayed aggressive. But most important we had fun.
“We just got to get back to that. And of course, I have to adjust to the team. Yeah, it’s getting there.”
Golden State Warriors
The Warriors traded De’Anthony Melton, who started next to Curry before sustaining a season-ending knee injury, to the Brooklyn Nets for Schröder because they possess similar skills. They offer elite perimeter defense and, on the offensive end, pose a credible scoring threat.
Schröder inherited the role from Melton, who inherited it from Klay Thompson, who in his prime was conceivably the best two-way shooting guard in the NBA.
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So, the Warriors needed some offense from Schröder. Needed it when it wasn’t there for his initial seven games, five of which were losses, while he averaged 9.1 points while shooting a ghastly 29.7 percent from the field, including 20.6 percent from distance. Needed it even as coach Steve Kerr’s consistently insisted the front office did not acquire the 31-year-old for offense. That was a coach being, um, deliberately artful.
The Warriors are not expecting Schröder to make 20-point games routine, but they couldn’t afford to keep starting him alongside Curry if he was going to be as stridently inefficient as he was in his first seven games.
Schröder's performance against the 76ers – 15 points, 5-of-9 shooting, including 3-of-4 from deep, six assists, two steals and superb defense against Philly star Tyrese Maxey – was like a prescription providing relief after several doses.
“He set a tone with his defense,” Kerr said of Schröder. “He also really pushed the ball around the floor. He's a fast point guard. We're really asking him to play even faster. Even if he doesn't have the ball, to just run up the floor instead of coming back and getting it.
“It's a little bit of an adjustment for him, like it would be for anybody coming into a new team in the middle of the year and not having a training camp. It looks like he's starting to get more comfortable with what we're trying to do.”
For most of his 11-year career, Schröder has been a relatively deliberate point guard, probing defenses in search of a clean look for a teammate or himself. Such a massive change in style does not make for a seamless transition.
“Yeah, it’s different,” Schröder acknowledged. “The last couple of years what they've been doing has been working and it’s great. For me, I’ve played with a lot of people in my career, and I always can adjust. Whatever they ask me to do, I’m always ready for it. But it’s going to take a little bit of time.”
Schröder’s first triple gave the Warriors a 29-15 lead late in the first quarter. Moses Moody drained one 35 seconds later, followed by another from Buddy Hield – his first after back-to-back games without one – that put the score at 35-19 to end the quarter.
Golden State’s double-digit lead remained throughout. The offense, dormant recently, suddenly was a living, fire-breathing organism.
Curry scored 30 points and made all eight of his 3-point attempts in a game for the ages. He is, and will be, the leader of the offense. But Schröder was, on this night, the instigator. His nine first-quarter points led the team; Curry entered the second quarter with three points.
“He brings a different mentality, a different aggressiveness, and yet what we've needed,” Draymond Green said of Schröder. “The last piece is his offense. We need that also. And he's starting to get more aggressive, which we like. It takes some time to come in in the middle of the season and try to find your way – especially on a team that's struggling. He's starting to do that. He's starting to figure out where to find his shots. He's being more aggressive.
“But what he brings to us on the defensive end is huge. With the way he gets into the ball for the opposing team’s best ball handler, it changes a lot of things for us. He's starting to come along and it's great because we need him to be really good for us to be good.”
This is Draymond, as usual, offering a frank assessment. Schröder played both ends as the Warriors visualized when they hired him. His energy and efficiency were infectious. That won’t always be the case, but this was proof of what’s reasonably possible.
