Warriors "Concerned" After Ugly, 94-90 Loss to the Magic

The Golden State Warriors are usually cool, calm and collected.

But if there ever was a time to start reaching for the panic button, now might be it.

In its second game without Stephen Curry, Golden State dropped an ugly game to the lowly Orlando Magic Tuesday night. And with the schedule for their five game road trip only primed to get tougher, the Warriors say they are “concerned” with the current state of their team.

“Is there any level of concern? Yeah,” head coach Steve Kerr said after the 94-90 loss. “We’ve lost two games in a row without Steph.. Yeah there’s a level of concern. We’ve got to get better.”

Coming off of a tough 110-108 loss to the San Antonio Spurs Sunday night, the Warriors looked to take advantage of an Orlando franchise in complete rebuild mode.

Sitting as the second-worst team in the Eastern conference with the third-worst record in the entire league, the Magic also ranked dead-last in scoring offense.

Golden State, however, found a way to play down to this level of competition, scoring just 17 points in the first quarter. To make matters worse, they finished the half with just 38 points.

It’s the second-straight game they’ve scored fewer than 40 points in the opening half — a blunder they haven’t seen all season. According to Kerr, there were many culprits to blame for this poor showing, ranging from turnovers to ill-advised fouls.

Steve Kerr’s grimmest postgame press conference maybe of the season: “I love these guys in the locker room. Awesome guys. I know they want to win. We just have to learn how to win. Right now, we don’t know how.” pic.twitter.com/1yOqeLYVmV
— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) March 23, 2022

“We have to execute better and we have to be smarter,” Kerr said. “We have to stop fouling three-point shooters. That’s killed us the last two games… We’ve got to take care of the ball and we can’t get illegal screens.”

When it comes to fouling three-point shooters, that may have very well cost the Warriors a chance to win Tuesday night despite their forgettable effort for most of the game. With seven 13 seconds left to play, down by one point, Klay Thompson fouled Orlando forward Franz Wagner, who hit all three free throws.

Had Thompson avoided the body contact, Golden State would have had an opportunity to score a game-winning basket with a timeout in their pocket.

But Golden State’s current set of issues goes beyond undisciplined defense, according to Draymond Green. He thinks it’s his team’s approach.

“I think we’re playing soft,” Green said after the game. “We’re playing stupid. We’re not playing good basketball and we’re getting punked. It’s hard to win games when you’re getting punked.”

Up next for the Warriors, they’ll see the No. 1 team in the Eastern Conference — the Miami Heat, who hold a two-game lead over the Milwaukee Bucks. Clearly, the sledding will only get tougher for the Warriors.