SI:AM | Lonnie Walker IV Put the Warriors on the Brink
Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. Between the Heat and former Hurricane Lonnie Walker IV, it was a good night for Miami.
In today’s SI:AM:
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The Warriors are in big trouble
The Lakers’ hero in Game 4 was a guy who didn’t even see the floor in Game 1.
Lonnie Walker IV, who has cycled in and out of the Lakers’ rotation since the team went through its radical overhaul at the trade deadline, erupted for 15 points in the fourth quarter as Los Angeles overcame a seven-point deficit to beat the Warriors, 104–101, and go up 3–1 in the series.
Walker was quiet in the 15 minutes he played during the first three quarters. He didn’t even attempt a shot. But in the fourth, he scored more points than the rest of the team combined. LeBron James had six, Anthony Davis had two and Austin Reeves had four.
Walker’s final field goal of the night was a midrange jumper that put the Lakers up for good, 100–99. Davis sealed the win with some lockdown defense that forced Stephen Curry to take two exceedingly difficult shots (even for him) in the final 30 seconds.
The Lakers’ win has the defending champion Warriors on the brink of elimination as the series shifts back to San Francisco tomorrow night. One of the biggest differences for Golden State this postseason compared to last has been the disappearance of Jordan Poole. He had seven 20-point games during last year’s playoffs and only two this year. Last night, he scored none.
Poole isn’t the only player to blame, though. Klay Thompson scored just 24 points over the two games in Los Angeles, shooting just 8-of-25 from the field. Curry shot a very uncharacteristic 3-of-14 from three in last night’s loss, and he knows the problems run deeper than Poole.
“We get questions about him a lot, and our whole team. We’re in this together in the sense of trying to figure out how to win playoff games,” Curry told reporters. “We all have to make adjustments. We all have to play better considering we’re in a 3–1 hole. So there’s no sense in isolating him in this situation. It’s all about collective, what can we all do to be better.”
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The Knicks are also at risk
The Lakers’ impressive playoff run, after an inconsistent regular season, has come as a surprise, but not as much of a shock as what the Heat are doing.
Miami made the playoffs only after surviving a do-or-die game against the Bulls in the play-in tournament. Now, the Heat are one win away from the conference finals.
For the Knicks, last night’s 109–101 loss came down to one simple factor: rebounding. More specifically, offensive rebounding. New York ranked third in rebounding this season and has gotten the best of Miami on the boards thus far during the series, but last night was a different story. While the Heat’s rebounding margin of 44–35 isn’t atrocious, the Knicks got burned on the offensive glass in the fourth quarter. Miami collected seven offensive rebounds in the final quarter. New York got one. The overall rebounding margin in the fourth was 17–8 in favor of Miami, thwarting any hopes of a Knicks comeback. Mitchell Robinson, who was a rebounding machine for the Knicks earlier in the playoffs, had just one board in the fourth quarter.
Rebounding wasn’t the only issue for the Knicks (Rohan Nadkarni has a list of three other things they need to do to avoid elimination), but it was what sunk them last night.
The best of Sports Illustrated
Greg Bishop/Sports Illustrated
- Greg Bishop uncovered the story behind a hockey bar in Seattle that became the beating heart of Kraken Nation in today’s Daily Cover story.
- The Red Sox are off to a surprisingly hot start at 21–15, but Tom Verducci explains why they won’t be able to keep up that winning pace.
- After West Virginia coach Bob Huggins used an anti-LGBTQ slur on a radio show yesterday, Pat Forde thinks it likely spells the end of his coaching career.
- With stolen bases increasing at historic levels, Emma Baccellieri looks back at the last time MLB saw such a drastic increase in steals and the reasons it happened.
- Ross Dellenger has the latest on the NCAA’s push to get Congress to pass NIL legislation.
- Iowa is the latest college sports program to run afoul of NCAA gambling rules. Nikola Jokić was not suspended for his interaction with Suns owner Matt Ishbia, drawing just a fine instead.
The top five...
… things I saw last night:
5. Willson Contreras’s double in his return to Wrigley.
4. Shohei Ohtani’s mind-boggling double off the end of the bat.
3. LeBron James’s smothering block on Stephen Curry.
2. Jack Eichel’s assist to Jonathan Marchessault in the Golden Knights’ 5–1 rout of the Oilers.
1. Akil Baddoo’s painful and unlucky caught stealing.
SIQ
On this day in 1984, umpire Joe West ejected two people from a game between the Mets and Braves who were employed in what nonuniformed role?
- Grounds crew member
- Concessions vendor
- Camera operator
- Official scorer
Yesterday’s SIQ: On May 8, 1994, the first professional women’s baseball team in 40 years played its first game. What company was their primary sponsor and gave the team a name referencing their product?
- Louisville Slugger
- Coors
- Coca Cola
- American Airlines
Answer: Coors. The team was called the Colorado Silver Bullets, after Coors Light, even though it was based in Georgia.
After the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (the basis for the movie A League of Their Own) folded in 1954, it took 40 years until another professional women’s baseball team took the field. The Silver Bullets played as a barnstorming team against semi-pro and amateur men’s teams from ’94 to ’97. When the team began looking for players in the spring of ’94, Sports Illustrated sent writer Amy Nutt to Arizona to take part in tryouts.
The Silver Bullets were operated by longtime Braves executive Bob Hope (not to be confused with the comedian of the same name) and managed by Hall of Fame Braves pitcher Phil Niekro. Players from the Silver Bullets were in attendance in Cooperstown when Niekro was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1997.
