Game 6Klay Thompson? The Warriors need him to face the Lakers on Friday

He warriors of the golden state took care of business in Game 5 to extend their second-round playoff series against the los angeles lakers. Stephen Curry, Andrew Wiggins and dramond green each scored at least 20 points, and the Warriors shot 51.1% from the field to beat the Lakers 121-106 on Wednesday night and avoid elimination.

It sets up Game 6 on Friday night in Los Angeles, where the Warriors will once again need to win to stay alive in the postseason. It’s a tall order, especially since only 13 teams in nba history have overcome a 3-1 deficit in the postseason. Golden State has been at both ends, blowing a lead and coming back to win a series, all of which happened in the same season.

Ironically, the guy who could be the key to the Warriors winning Game 6 against the Lakers and going one step closer to overcoming this current 3-1 deficit, is the same guy who helped them do it for the first time in 2016: klay thompson.

The reasoning behind this is unclear, but the reality is that Thompson has a penchant for going absolutely nuts in Game 6 of the playoffs. It began in the 2016 postseason, when Thompson and the Warriors were trying to rally from a 3-1 deficit against the oklahoma city thunder in the Western Conference Finals. In Game 6 with Golden State trailing 3-2 in the series, Thompson scored 41 points in 40 minutes, shooting 11-of-18 from deep. The Warriors ultimately won the series. He had a similar nuclear performance in 2018 against the houston rockets in the Western Conference Finals. Thompson had 35 points on 13-of-23 shooting to help the Warriors tie the series at three games apiece before advancing to the NBA Finals and winning another title.

After missing two seasons with serious injuries, Thompson was at it again last season in the second round of the playoffs against the memphis grizzlies. His 30 points on 50% from the field in Game 6 sent the Grizzlies packing, and the Warriors won, you guessed it, another championship.

But unlike most of those previous cases, the Warriors are desperate for a classic Game 6 Klay performance. No longer just a fun nickname to attach to your name, Golden State needs Thompson shows up for Game 6 better than he has in the previous three meetings in this series. Over the past three games, Thompson has had 15, 9 and 10 points, while shooting a combined 29.7% from the field and 33.3% from deep. Aside from Golden State’s Game 2 win in which Thompson had 30 points on 61% shooting from the field, he has shot incredibly poorly, which has been one of the main reasons Golden State is in this season. situation at this time.

Some of it is credit to LA’s defense. The Lakers have more capable defenders than the Kings He did in the first round, and they’re getting pretty close to Thompson as he navigates all those no-ball screens to shoot shots. As a result, 26.3% of Thompson’s 3-pointers in this series have come with a defender within 2-4 feet of him. On those shots, he’s shooting just 33.3% from deep. He shot 45.2% from deep in the first round against Sacramento with a defender 2-4 feet from him, so you could say his poor performance is a bit of the LA defense and a bit of a bad shooting streak.

If it’s a shooting slump, the Warriors have to wait for it to come to an end on Friday night, because trusting Green to replicate his performance in Game 5 is a bit hard to pull off. The good news is that when Thompson left in a Game 6 against the Grizzlies last season, it came after he shot 38.1% from the field and 29.3% from deep in the first five games of that season. series. If Thompson follows the same trend, then he could have a big performance in Game 6, adding another chapter to Klay’s Game 6 legend. At least, that’s what Golden State hopes will happen.