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      For the Raptors, Scottie Barnes Can Do a Little Bit of Everything

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      Barnes is a finalist for the Rookie of the Year Award. But he has bigger aspirations than that, starting with winning a championship this year.When the Toronto Raptors selected forward Scottie Barnes with the fourth pick of the 2021 N.B.A. draft, some people in the basketball world raised their eyebrows. Jalen Suggs, considered one of the can’t-miss prospects, was still on the board.One regular season later, the Raptors look prescient. The 20-year-old Barnes is a top contender for the Rookie of the Year Award. He’s evoked comparisons to Vince Carter and Damon Stoudamire, the two Raptors who have been named rookie of the year.“I had actually never been to Toronto,” Barnes told The New York Times recently. “I never even thought of being in Toronto. It was just never a thought in my mind. It’s not as different as I thought it would be. The only thing that is different is just that weather, because I’m from Florida.”At his best, the 6-foot-9 Barnes is a versatile dynamo with a game similar to, but much less refined than, that of Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo. This season, Barnes started all 74 of the games he played in, averaging 15.3 points, 7.5 rebounds and 3.5 assists per game on 49.2 percent shooting. In one blink, he can speed the ball up court as a quasi-point guard. In another, he attacks the rim for thunderous dunks. Raptors Coach Nick Nurse has often had Barnes defend top players, including Kevin Durant and Luka Doncic.Barnes said he wants to leave a legacy of being “a great all-around player.”Charles Rex Arbogast/Associated PressNow, he’s a key to Toronto’s hopes to win the championship. He fits the mold of the players who helped the Raptors win the franchise’s first title, in 2019, General Manager Bobby Webster said.“These really kind of versatile, long forwards that can do a bunch are just hard to come by,” he said. “And if they hit, they can be really valuable and productive players.”The question mark for Barnes is his long-range shooting. He hit just 30.1 percent of his 3-pointers during the regular season, and even that was an improvement on his lone year at Florida State University, where he shot 27.5 percent from 3.Barnes, who grew up in West Palm Beach, Fla., helped the Raptors claim the fifth seed in the Eastern Conference and a matchup with the Philadelphia 76ers in the first round of the playoffs. During Game 1 on Saturday, Barnes was given the task of trying to contain James Harden, but he left the game with an ankle injury and was out for Game 2 on Monday. Toronto missed Barnes’s defense and energy, and lost in a 112-97 blowout to fall to 0-2 in the series. Game 3 is Wednesday, and it’s not clear if Barnes will be able to play.In an interview with The Times before the playoffs, Barnes discussed the strong start to his career, his confidence level and his campaign for the Rookie of the Year Award.This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.It was considered pretty surprising at the time that the Raptors picked you at No. 4 in the draft. What ran through your head when your name was announced?Even throughout the whole predraft process, I really just went in with no expectation. Really, paying no mind. I really was just not worrying about things that I couldn’t control. So I really just went there and just was me wherever I went. So going into that when they said my name, I was just really excited, really happy. I didn’t really know what was going to happen, so I didn’t really have any expectation. So I was just a huge burst of excitement.Barnes has become known for his energy, off and on the court. He’s often tasked with the toughest defensive assignments.Frank Gunn/The Canadian Press, via Associated PressWhat do you remember about your predraft conversations with Raptors president Masai Ujiri?He is a big person on winning. Just winning, winning, winning. So, me, I’m a big person on winning, too. So, really, it was just like, we just both really had a mutual mind.What’s been the hardest thing about jumping to the N.B.A. so far?Either traveling as much or just adjusting to, like, the refs and really how they call the game.When you have free time, what do you like to do?Just chill at the crib and play video games.What are you playing right now?Play NBA 2K. Call of Duty. Fortnite.When you play 2K, do you play as the Raptors?I don’t really play as teams. I usually play a create-a-player mode.What was your favorite moment of the regular season?So one of our favorite games played this year was probably with the Brooklyn Nets. K.D. [Kevin Durant] and James [Harden]. I think it was at their house, but we lost. But it was an interesting game. There was a lot of trash talk being involved. So it made it more fun. There was trash talking, and we were trash-talking back, and it was awesome. It was going down to the wire, going back and forth, back and forth. But I would say it was a great game.Barnes had 23 points and 12 points against the Nets in a game on Dec. 14. The Raptors lost by 2 points.Sarah Stier/Getty ImagesDo you trash-talk on the floor?Sometimes. Not as much, but only sometimes I will. But I won’t say so much out here.LeBron James said he watched you play in seventh grade. Did you know that until he said that recently?I don’t remember him saying it. It sounds great, but I know he watched me in 10th or ninth grade year when I played with Zaire — Dwyane Wade’s son. Him and Dwyane Wade were courtside watching our games. I hit a game-winner and I clapped him and D-Wade up. I was hype and I went to the sideline and sniped D-Wade and Bron’s hand after the game because I just hit a buzzer-beater. But to see those guys just say those things about me, it shows that people see that potential in me of what I can do.Were you one of the popular kids in school? What were you like?I was always an outgoing kid. Not saying I was so popular, but, you know, I had that core, that little swagger. I was very talkative, a kid with a lot of energy. So I would say I had a good amount of friends. I was always like one of those funny kids in class.There are a lot of comparisons between your impact as a rookie and Vince Carter’s and Damon Stoudamire’s. Have you ever spoken to Vince Carter at all?I actually did. I saw him at one of our games this year and I went up to him. I said, “What’s up?” We really couldn’t have that much conversation. I actually saw Damon Stoudamire at the mall in Boston, and we chatted it up for a little while. Went up to him. Recognized him. And I just started talking to him.What kind of impact are you hoping to leave in the league?In this league, I would say I want to, of course, win rookie of the year this year. Be on the All-Defensive team, multiple times. Be a future M.V.P. Be a finals M.V.P. Be a finals N.B.A. champion multiple times. Of course, be a multiple-time All-Star. Really, just leave that legacy. that I was just a great all-around player.Is there something that makes you rookie of the year over the other candidates?Really just doing so many different types of things, and being that versatile player that’s just having a big impact on our team really winning basketball games. More

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      Golden State’s Playoff Reappearance Doesn’t Quite Feel Like Old Times

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      The heart of the roster — Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green — is back in the N.B.A. playoffs, a world away from the team’s soul in Oakland.SAN FRANCISCO — The scene felt both comfortingly familiar and oddly askew.Warming up before Game 1 of the Golden State Warriors’ first-round playoff series against the Denver Nuggets, Klay Thompson launched orbital jump shots beside his longtime teammate Stephen Curry. The nets singed with swishes, same as they ever had.This was a home game for Golden State, which in the not-too-distant past — let’s just say anytime during the five straight N.B.A. finals appearances and three championship titles that began in the 2014-15 season — would have meant Oakland, inside the madhouse bandbox known as “Roaracle,” the worn-at-the-heels arena long known as one of the loudest in sports.But that was the past.This was San Francisco. The present. Chase Center. The first Golden State playoff game since 2019. A crowd full of new fans who can afford the astronomical ticket prices. A crowd still learning how to love its favorite team.At Oracle, fans rarely left their seats during the heart of the action.At Chase, there are so many amenities — lounge-like lobbies, $25 lobster rolls — that plenty of seats were open as the first half wound to a close Saturday with Golden State on a scintillating run that propelled it to a 123-107 victory.At Oracle, fans often broke out into a loud chants that seemed to spell doom for opponents.At Chase, fans chanted, but the sound seemed comparatively diminished, the cadence, strength and timing not quite right.What a difference nearly three years makes for two great American cities and one great global brand of an N.B.A. team.On June 13, 2019, Golden State played its final game at Oracle Arena in the heart of Oakland. Presaging the dark days ahead, the Toronto Raptors won Game 6 of the N.B.A. finals, snatching the title from the defending champion, closing the building and ending Golden State’s run as this century’s most dominant N.B.A. team. Thompson tore up his left knee in that game. Kevin Durant, felled by an Achilles’ tear in that series, signed with the Nets within weeks.A mural of Curry adorned the rear wall of a gym complex near Jack London Square in Oakland in 2019.Jim Wilson/The New York TimesGolden State now plays in a three-year-old crown jewel of a waterfront stadium nestled across the bay, tucked within a high-priced neighborhood of gleaming shops, offices and condominiums.But the longtime, nearly spiritual bond between Oakland and its famed basketball team remains. Emblazoned on Curry’s shoes Saturday was the word “Oakland” in a gold font. The players still speak of the city as if it is sacred. “The soul of our team comes from Oakland,” Draymond Green said this year.To get a sense of the city and gauge how residents feel about losing a team that bonded with its home community as few franchises do, I spent a few days in Oakland last week. I walked the downtown streets and the working class neighborhoods near the old Oracle, now known as Oakland Arena. I visited a mosque and an old church, several tiendas, a shopping mall, a soul food joint and several homes.I trudged around the old arena, which looks sad and forlorn. It is primarily a concert venue now. Maxwell, the silky-voiced R&B singer, had been set to play on Saturday night, but his concert was postponed.That seemed symbolic. Nothing seems certain in Oakland these days. As the city struggles to recover from the worst of the pandemic, its connection with professional sports — a history that includes 10 league championships won in Oakland among its N.B.A. franchise, the A’s of M.L.B. and the Raiders of the N.F.L. — hangs by a thread.The Raiders followed the Golden State blueprint and left for Las Vegas in 2020.The A’s remain, but for how long? On Monday, when they play their 2022 home opener against the Baltimore Orioles, they will take the field at a decrepit old stadium that looked marvelous when it was built in the 1960s but now has the charm of a concrete coffin.With the team’s plan to build a waterfront stadium along the busy Oakland port at a standstill, the city again in financial distress and the A’s team owner flirting with Las Vegas, nobody can say that professional baseball will stay put.“Very soon, we might have no teams here,” said Paul Brekke-Miesner, a historian of the Oakland sports scene who has lived in the city’s hardscrabble eastern flats for decades. Brekke-Miesner grimaced, thinking of Oakland and its long heritage of professional sports greatness now fading.Seeing Golden State play a postseason series at the Chase Center, “it’s more than a gut punch,” he said, echoing a sentiment I heard often. The wound remains raw. “And it’s so ironic because we have the legacy here as far as basketball, but that doesn’t matter to the owners anymore. They don’t understand.”Perhaps this should not surprise. The relocation of teams tears at the fabric of a community, but it is nothing new.The Raiders started in Oakland, moved to Los Angeles, came back to Oakland and now have a Las Vegas address.Both the A’s and the Warriors were born in Philadelphia.When the basketball franchise came west in 1962, it played in San Francisco. Oakland didn’t become home until 1971. What’s old is new again.More than once last week, I heard Oakland residents describe going to Golden State games at the arena in their city as akin to a spiritual undertaking. When the team was in Oakland, through lean years and world titles it oozed with the town’s vibe — soulful, tough, while also willing to break old norms and throw jabs at the status quo.Oakland birthed the Black Panthers and became one of the most diverse and progressive cities in the nation. It produced a slew of trailblazing athletes, iconic and unafraid. Bill Russell, Frank Robinson and Curt Flood to name three. That Curry changed how basketball is played while suiting up in Oakland felt perfect.“Oracle was like my cathedral,” one longtime fan told me, thinking back to all the games he watched from the rafter seats while Curry strung together mind-bending 3-pointers as if touched by grace. “Chase Center? Hmm. Definitely not.”It’s not anyone’s cathedral just yet.“Oracle, especially during the playoffs over the years, was just an incredible atmosphere,” Steve Kerr, Golden State’s coach, said before Game 1. “Those are amazing memories that will last a lifetime. Now it’s time to start some new ones.”Getting out to a 1-0 series lead was a good beginning. Even if the home crowd, still learning how to rise with raucous chants, made three years seem like eons and Oakland feel far, far away. More

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      Boston Celtics Buzzer-Beater Takes Down Kyrie Irving and the Nets

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      Irving, the Nets guard, had a brilliant Game 1 against Boston on Sunday, but the Celtics, led by Jayson Tatum and his buzzer-beater, ended up on top.BOSTON — There was a time when Celtics fans were excited about Kyrie Irving. They can recall the summer of 2017, when Irving forced his way out of Cleveland and landed in Boston, where he delighted in the Celtics’ illustrious past and pledged to do what he could to help the team win.But over Irving’s two seasons with the Celtics, all that communal excitement morphed into a bunch of different stuff: tolerance as he struggled with injuries, then impatience as he criticized teammates, then something that resembled rage as it became clear that he and Boston were bound for a divorce.On Sunday afternoon, Irving was back in Boston, where a fervent crowd at TD Garden christened Game 1 of the Celtics’ first-round playoff series with the Nets by booing Irving at every opportunity. They booed him when he emerged from the visitors’ tunnel for warm-ups. They booed him during introductions. They booed him whenever he touched the ball. And he nearly silenced them with another tour de force in a career full of them.But in the opener of a best-of-seven-game clash between teams with outsize goals, Jayson Tatum sent the arena into a state of pandemonium with a layup at the buzzer that gave the Celtics a 115-114 win. Game 2 is in Boston on Wednesday.“It was fulfilling for us, especially the way we started this year off,” Celtics guard Marcus Smart said. “The resilience we have, the approach we have, the work we put in and learning — we had a lot of games to learn from early in the year.”As the series continues, the Celtics will need to put all that knowledge to use against Irving, who was spectacular in Game 1. He finished with 39 points and 6 assists, and his 3-pointer with 45.9 seconds left put the Nets ahead by 3. In the process, he reminded Boston why the city wanted him in the first place, while underscoring all the bitterness that has followed.Those feelings resurfaced at various points of the game. On at least two occasions, Irving appeared to raise his middle fingers at fans sitting near the court. He said in his postgame news conference that people in the crowd were swearing at him and referring to him using explicit terms.“It’s nothing new when I come into this building, what it’s going to be like,” he said. “But the same energy they have for me, I’m going to have the same energy for them.”He added: “There’s only so much you take as a competitor. We’re the ones expected to be docile and humble and take a humble approach. Nah.”For most of the game, Irving let his play do the talking. The Celtics were undaunted in the final minute, though, and after Jaylen Brown drove for a layup, the Nets’ Kevin Durant missed a long 3-pointer. At the other end, Smart found Tatum, who spun past Irving for a layup with the clock winding down. It was his easiest bucket of the night.“I think that’s kind of a microcosm of our season: guys moving the ball, playing unselfish,” Celtics Coach Ime Udoka said. “It all came together on the last possession.”Tatum finished with 31 points, and Brown had 23. Smart had an astounding all-around game, collecting 20 points, 7 rebounds, 6 assists and 2 steals. Durant had 23 points and shot just 9 of 24.For the second straight postseason, the Nets and the Celtics are meeting in the first round. Last year, the Nets advanced in five games in a series that only inflamed the dynamic between Irving, who appeared to stomp on the Celtics’ logo at midcourt, and Boston fans, one of whom chucked a water bottle at him.Irving shooting over Boston guard Marcus Smart, a finalist for the Defensive Player of the Year Award. The Boston fans booed Irving, a former Celtic, throughout the game.David Butler Ii/USA Today Sports, via ReutersThat series also helped spur significant change in the Celtics’ organization. Brad Stevens moved to the front office after eight seasons as the team’s head coach. His job was filled by Udoka, a longtime N.B.A. assistant and Gregg Popovich disciple who seems to have unlocked the collaborative potential of Tatum and Brown. Remember when the Celtics had a losing record, 23-24, in late January? They closed the regular season by going 28-7.Udoka entered the series uniquely familiar with the Nets. Last season, as one of Coach Steve Nash’s assistants, Udoka got to know Irving and Durant — and their gifts.Amid a sloppy, foul-marred start, the Celtics’ top-ranked defense gave the Nets fits, forcing seven first-quarter turnovers. The game’s assembled stars — Irving, Durant, Brown and Tatum — combined to miss 12 of their first 14 field-goal attempts.Irving got going early in the second quarter with a pair of 3-pointers, the second on a pull-up in transition. The game was tied at 61 at halftime before the Celtics began to roll — a jolt that was predictably predicated on their defense. Late in the third quarter, Jaylen Brown blocked the Nets’ Bruce Brown at the rim, then raced away to convert a layup at the other end. Then the Nets took their turn, but Tatum blocked a jump shot by Durant, then hit a 3-pointer to extend Boston’s lead to 11.Irving was virtually unstoppable in the fourth quarter, scoring 18 points on 7 of 9 shooting, which set the stage for the game’s dramatic conclusion.“I don’t know that there’s any atmospheres that are going to rattle him,” Nash said, adding: “The guy’s done about all you can do in the game.”The Nets secured the No. 7 seed in the Eastern Conference playoffs by defeating the Cleveland Cavaliers in the play-in tournament on Tuesday. The Celtics had an even longer layoff, with a full week to prepare, since they closed their regular season on April 10 as the No. 2 seed.Boston’s Jaylen Brown, left, driving against Kevin Durant. Brown had 23 points on 9 of 19 shooting.Maddie Meyer/Getty ImagesThe Celtics were without Robert Williams, their rim-protecting, fourth-year center. Williams was having a breakout season when he tore the meniscus in his left knee last month and had surgery. Udoka said the Celtics were preparing as if Williams would not be available for the series, though Udoka did not rule out the possibility — however remote — of Williams returning. “He’s progressing nicely,” Udoka said.Before the game, the Celtics’ game operations crew spiced things up a bit on the arena’s video board by flashing a quote from Bruce Brown about how the Nets could “attack” Al Horford and Daniel Theis in Williams’s absence. (The crowd booed.) Horford was terrific on Sunday, finishing with 20 points and 15 rebounds, and he was animated throughout the game. Having Williams, of course, would only enhance the team’s championship hopes.The Nets are used to waiting, too. They waited for Irving to get vaccinated against the coronavirus, and when he was unwilling to do so, they waited for New York City to lift its vaccine mandates so that he could play in home games. Now, the Nets are waiting — still waiting — for Ben Simmons to take the court for the first time since they acquired him in a midseason trade with the Philadelphia 76ers.Simmons, who has not played since last postseason, has been dealing with a balky back since arriving in Brooklyn, and no one has any idea what he would look like if he were actually to take the floor against the Celtics. On Saturday, apparently for the benefit of reporters who were monitoring his progress, Simmons dunked at practice.“Make sure you get this,” he said to those who were filming him with their cellphones.On Sunday, Simmons wore mirrored sunglasses on the visitors’ bench as Irving and the rest of the Nets went about their business in a hostile environment. For one afternoon, at least, and by the slimmest of margins, the Celtics were the more complete team. More

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      The Sixers Get a Win, but Not a Chance to Exhale

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      The Game 1 victory over the Raptors won’t ease the pressure on Joel Embiid and James Harden, who have played well but come up short in the end before.PHILADELPHIA — There was a nervous energy throughout the Wells Fargo Center on Saturday evening as the Philadelphia 76ers prepared to play Game 1 of their first-round playoff series against the Toronto Raptors.The Sixers have star power that should overwhelm most other teams, but their stars have had trouble in the playoffs before. Joel Embiid, who led the N.B.A. in points per game during the regular season, has never been past the second round of the playoffs. James Harden, who won the league’s Most Valuable Player Award in 2017-18, has not been past the conference finals since he reached the N.B.A. finals with the Oklahoma City Thunder in 2012.Did fans in the building dare hope that this team could win the franchise’s first championship since 1983?Could Harden and Embiid come together quickly enough, despite having played only 21 regular-season games together?The 76ers beat the Raptors, 131-111, avoiding the pitfalls that have ensnared them before against Toronto. They outrebounded the Raptors. They committed just one turnover in the game’s first 44 minutes. Game 1 offered hope.The Sixers had a muted response to their Game 1 victory against the Raptors: “It’s only one game,” Joel Embiid said.Chris Szagola/Associated PressBut hope has its limits. If they are to prove that this group can succeed where past versions failed, the 76ers must build on Saturday night’s performance. The pressure on Embiid and Harden did not dissipate with the win.“It’s only one game,” Embiid said, repeatedly, during his postgame news conference.Embiid scored 19 points and grabbed 15 rebounds. Harden scored 22 points and had 14 assists. But the real star of the game for the 76ers was Tyrese Maxey, who scored 38 points, making 14 of his 21 shot attempts.Late in the third quarter, Harden saw Maxey beating the Raptors down the court and grabbed the ball with both hands to throw Maxey a perfectly placed bounce pass that went nearly three-quarters the length of the court. Maxey caught it and scored with a reverse layup.That play offered an example of the 21-year-old guard’s value to Philadelphia.“He’s like the perfect player,” Harden said before commending Maxey’s ability to take advantage of times when he and Embiid drew multiple defenders.Maxey couldn’t stop smiling as he checked out for the last time. He sat on the bench with the scoreboard camera fixed on him as the crowd chanted his name over and over. After the game, though, he didn’t bask in the adulation.“The only thing I’m going to remember is us winning,” Maxey said. “That’s all that matters at this point. Now this is in my rearview mirror.”The crowd erupted with what felt like a mixture of joy and relief — Philadelphia’s performance eased the tension in the building. But there remained an acute awareness that winning Game 1 does not mean you will win the series.Harden knows what it is like to lose a series after winning its first game. In fact, it’s happened to him in the past two seasons. Last year, his Nets won Game 1 of a second-round series against Milwaukee before losing the series in seven games. Two years ago, his Rockets won Game 1 of a second-round series against the Lakers before losing the next four games.Fair or not, this postseason will be the start of a referendum on the team that has been assembled in Philadelphia.The Sixers replaced Ben Simmons, who was the first overall pick in the 2016 draft, with Harden in a trade in February.Immediately after the trade, the 76ers started beating up on their opponents. They won the first game Harden played for them, beating the Minnesota Timberwolves by 31 points. Harden scored 27, and when he was in the game, the 76ers outscored the Timberwolves.Philadelphia’s hiccups since Harden’s arrival, though, have been concerning. The Sixers lost to the Nets by 29 points in the first game between the teams since the trade. They lost twice to the Raptors in the final month of the season.Simmons has not played for the Nets yet, but one could argue that the Nets are better poised to make a run in the playoffs than Philadelphia, despite being the seventh seed in the East, because of Kyrie Irving and the transcendent talent of Kevin Durant.Sixers guard Tyrese Maxey was the game’s leading scorer with 38 points. The 21-year-old is in his second N.B.A. season.Chris Szagola/Associated PressHarden was not particularly efficient against the Raptors on Saturday. He made 6 of 17 shots and only 2 of 10 2-pointers. He made his impact in assisting his teammates.“I don’t think we’ve seen really what he can do,” Embiid said. “But he was comfortable tonight: made the right plays, found guys, went to the line a couple times even though they weren’t calling all his fouls for him. But it was good to see him aggressive.”Coach Doc Rivers agreed that Harden seemed comfortable in the offense.“You could tell. You could see it out there,” Rivers said. “He called plays himself.”Rivers attributed that in part to his decision to simplify the team’s playbook and focus on the few plays he knew they could run well.Maxey’s contributions were also critical to their plan. He sat on the podium next to Harden Saturday night and revealed a mischievous grin as Harden spoke about his postseason experiences.“I’ve been in the playoffs 13 years,” Harden said.Maxey interjected to call him old.“Sorry,” Maxey said, as if he were a child caught misbehaving, before looking away and then smiling at the 32-year-old Harden again.“I just wanted to play well,” Harden said. “I wanted to individually make sure I’m doing the right things, do what’s necessary for our team to win. Tonight I feel like individually I had an OK game, but that’s what you got a great team for.”For Game 1 the 76ers got what they needed, but there’s no guarantee that the same formula will be enough as the playoffs progress — or even as this series moves to Game 2 on Monday. More

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      Steph Curry Returns, and Golden State Beats the Nuggets

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      Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green, Golden State’s championship core, are back together in the postseason for the first time since 2019.Klay Thompson was splashing 3-pointers. Draymond Green was making stops and deftly finding open cutters. Stephen Curry drew several defenders any time he touched the ball.The threesome who redefined basketball en route to winning multiple championships with the Golden State Warriors reunited in the playoffs on Saturday for the first time since 2019. And like in many games of that era, the high-octane Warriors were dominant, defeating the Denver Nuggets in the opener of their first-round playoff matchup, 123-107.In a surprise move, Curry began the game on the bench. In his place, Coach Steve Kerr started the third-year guard Jordan Poole, who made a leap this year. The move appeared to be aimed at keeping Curry on a strict minutes limit. This was his first game since March 16, when he injured his left foot against the Boston Celtics.The swap paid off. Poole was exceptional in his first career playoff game, scoring 30 points — a game high — on 9 for 13 shooting, electrifying the Chase Center crowd in San Francisco. He played as if he had long been a mainstay of postseason basketball. At one point, he did a dance after scoring a difficult basket. It was that kind of night. On a team of stars who had played on some of the most talented teams in league history, it was a 22-year-old selected with the 28th pick of the 2019 draft who stole the show as Golden State attempted to recapture the N.B.A. throne.Jordan Poole has been a key source of offense for Golden State this season, with injuries keeping top stars off the court for months at a time. He had 30 points on Saturday.Ezra Shaw/Getty Images“Jordan Poole, wow, what a playoff debut,” Thompson raved to reporters after the game, adding: “We should be very grateful for Jordan’s development and the type of player he’s become because he’s just incredible. I mean, what a star in the making.”The last time Curry came off the bench during the playoffs was May 1, 2018, the second game of the Western Conference semifinals against the New Orleans Pelicans, when he was returning from a knee injury. Saturday against Denver was only the third playoff game of Curry’s career in which he played but didn’t start.He entered the contest about halfway through the first quarter to a loud ovation. Almost immediately, Curry made his presence felt, finding Thompson for an open 3-pointer from the corner and sneaking a pass between two defenders to an open Green for a dunk. Otherwise, he struggled, shooting 5 for 13 from the field for 16 points. But his presence alone still drew outsize attention from the Nuggets, and the Warriors outscored Denver by 17 points with Curry on the floor.“It was nice to feel the playoff vibe again, and obviously it is different coming off the bench and trying to make the most of the minutes that are appropriate right now,” Curry said.Poole’s strong play presents a dilemma — of the good kind — for Kerr going forward. With Curry back, can he send Poole to the bench for the rest of the playoffs?“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” Kerr said.Poole’s strong play will give Kerr more options for the rest of the series. For one thing, he can deploy a three-guard lineup of Curry, Thompson and Poole — three playmakers and shooters. It’s reminiscent of the closing small-ball lineups that the Warriors used to deploy at their best during their championship runs of the last decade — except with Poole playing the part of Andre Iguodala, who now has a smaller role.An added benefit of Poole’s emergence is that it allows Golden State to ease Curry’s ramp up coming off the foot injury. Kerr declined to say whether Curry would come off the bench again for Game 2 on Monday.Klay Thompson had 19 points, including 5 of 10 3-pointers, in Golden State’s win over the Denver Nuggets on Saturday. He injured his knee in his last playoff game, in 2019.Jeff Chiu/Associated PressThompson, meanwhile, looked like the player he was before he tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee during the 2019 N.B.A. finals. He moved swiftly to find open looks for himself, en route to five 3-pointers and 19 points overall.“Before the tip I thought about all the days in the gym, the days in a doctor’s office, on the surgery table and then just to be flying up and down the court, knocking shots down and playing solid defense, it was a surreal moment for me,” Thompson said after the game.Denver, on the other hand, will have to go back to the drawing board.Golden State was able to flummox the Nuggets’ top star, Nikola Jokic, who is the favorite to win his second Most Valuable Player Award. The Warriors constantly forced Jokic into difficult shots and frustrated him with a steady stream of double teams. They also attempted to tire him out defensively by setting up possessions with him as the primary defender. On possession after possession, Jokic was sent scurrying after the speedy Golden State ballhandlers.“They were just better than us in every aspect of the game,” Jokic said.But the Warriors also have Green, who won the Defensive Player of the Year Award in 2016-17. He was able to do something most defenders can’t: guard Jokic one on one for multiple possessions, freeing his Golden State teammates to stay attached to other Nuggets players Jokic might pass to.By the time the fourth quarter came around, Jokic looked exhausted. He finished with 25 points, 10 rebounds and 6 assists. He went to the free throw line two times, despite attempting 25 shots. Denver appeared to be frustrated with the officiating.“I think there were some times where, you know, his jersey was getting pulled out a lot,” Nuggets Coach Mike Malone said. “So I don’t know. We got to see how they’re guarding him and how we can make them pay for how they’re guarding him.”Golden State’s Draymond Green had 12 points, 6 rebounds and 9 assists against Denver on Saturday. He missed dozens of regular-season games with a back injury.Ezra Shaw/Getty ImagesWhen Jokic was asked about the officiating after the game by a reporter, he said, “My friend, I think I’m going to get fined if I answer.”The playoff opener was a return to the postseason spotlight for the core Golden State players who won championships in 2015, 2017 and 2018. Curry, Green, Thompson and Iguodala are the top four leaders in franchise history for postseason games played. But this was the first time, in large part because of injuries, that the Warriors had made the playoffs since 2019, when the team lost in the finals to the Toronto Raptors in six games. The only time all four of them played in the same game this year was on Jan. 9, Thompson’s first game back after missing two seasons with leg injuries. Green only started that game briefly, to support Thompson, before sitting the rest of the night.Both teams had significant injury issues during the season. Green missed more than two months of the regular season for Golden State with a back injury. For Denver, Michael Porter Jr. and Jamal Murray missed most or all of the season; they often can take the pressure off Jokic for playmaking.This was Denver’s fourth straight year making the playoffs; the team has made it out of the first round each of the past three seasons.There is a source of solace for Denver: In each of those series, the Nuggets lost the first game. The Nuggets will attempt to tie the seven-game series at one game apiece on Monday. But they looked overmatched on Saturday night.“We can’t beat ourselves and the Warriors in the same game,” Malone said. “We did that tonight.” More

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      How it Feels to Watch Ja Morant Fly: ‘A Magician Up There’

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      Sarah Bolton maneuvers in the air for a living, using silks and hammocks to defy gravity at heights of up to 25 feet. The sensation of being in the air, she said, is often one of empowerment, an extension of childhood fantasies becoming adult realities.Bolton runs the aerial arts school High Expectations in Memphis, where Ja Morant, too, is a high-flyer, as the All-Star point guard of the N.B.A.’s Grizzlies. Bolton said she can appreciate the similarities between her livelihood and Morant’s, especially his windmill dunk to finish an alley-oop against the Orlando Magic last season.“To do that while he’s in the air with nothing to push up against, that’s incredible,” Bolton said.One aerial artist can certainly recognize another.Morant’s Grizzlies, set to play the Minnesota Timberwolves in the first round of the playoffs, were one of the most satisfying surprises this season. Memphis finished 56-26, second in the Western Conference, with an exciting young core who compete at a frenetic pace. They are a far cry from the popular grit-and-grind Grizzlies of the 2010s who pounded the ball in to post mainstays like Zach Randolph and Marc Gasol.Morant is the lofty, dynamic centerpiece to Memphis’s makeover, a guard who skies in the air and executes in a manner arguably unvisited since the ascendant takeoffs of Vince Carter and Michael Jordan.Wendell Cruz/USA Today Sports, via ReutersRocky Widner/NBAE via Getty ImagesNot many people in the world — N.B.A. players included — know what it’s like to elevate and seemingly levitate quite like Morant. He recorded a standing vertical leap of 44 inches before the Grizzlies drafted him No. 2 overall, behind New Orleans’ selection of Zion Williamson, in 2019.“Think it’s just pure skill,” Morant said. “I don’t know too much that I can say about it. It’s just a natural thing for me.”But some in Memphis and West Tennessee, those like Bolton who often operate in the air, recognize and applaud Morant’s vertical capabilities.“I enjoy the looks on his face when he has those moments,” Bolton said. “He does these things that you think is physically impossible and it’s just this pure joy.”The 6-foot-3 Morant is a few inches shorter than his vaulting predecessors Carter and Jordan, which makes his gravity-defying exploits all the more impressive.He is an aerial dynamo playing in an era when most players his height are stretching the game horizontally by expanding their shooting range. He does that, too, but he lives in the air.There was his dunk all over Jakob Poeltl, the San Antonio Spurs’ 7-foot-1 center, in February, and his soaring left-handed alley-oop finish against the Boston Celtics in March. In January, Morant used both of his hands (and banged his brow against the backboard) against the Los Angeles Lakers to block Avery Bradley’s attempt. “Instinctual,” Morant said of his elevation efforts.And those are just some of his displays from this season.“Like, how do you bump your head on the backboard,” said Aaron Shafer, a California transplant who opened Society Memphis, an indoor skating park and coffee shop. “I don’t understand it.”Even Morant’s misses provide highlight-worthy clips because of his athleticism and the audacity of his imagination.Morant did not start dunking regularly until near the end of his high school career in Sumter, S.C. By then, Williamson, a former A.A.U. teammate, had long ago become a national dunking sensation.For a while, Morant had the ambition, but not the ability.“It’s a practiced intuition,” Shafer said. “It’s something that he’s put so many hours into over his lifetime, starting as a kid. You are having the right to have that intuition, it’s not something that you just get.”Morant warms up before the game with a between-the-legs dunk.Brandon Dill/Associated PressSawyer Sides, a 14-year-old BMX rider at Tennessee’s Shelby Farms, equated Morant’s ability to anticipate plays before his leaps with competing in a motocross race.“Say I’m in second or third,” Sides said. “I have to get where other people aren’t if I want to make a pass. You can see a window opening 10 seconds before it even starts happening. It’s like him thinking about the play as if he’s on the other side of the court already.”SJ Smith, who is training to become an instructor at High Expectations, said Morant’s successful vertical forays begin when he steers his momentum into a strong plié and bends his knees before lifting off.“In order to gain height, you have to set that up,” Smith said. “He is so kinesthetically intelligent and intuitive, where he’s internalized and practiced a crap ton to set himself up to be a magician up there.”Bolton, a former dancer, entered aerial arts for the freedom that operating in the air provides.Like a Morant dunk, aerial artistry involves a mix of control and technique through core and upper body strength and the constant interplay between activating muscles and releasing them.“You have to really understand where your body is in space before you can layer on the momentum,” Bolton said. “Using momentum, you’re putting your body almost at the whim of this external force, but you have to learn how to control it. When I watch Ja do what he does, it’s similar. He’s so strong, but there’s also this float and this release that he finds.”Bolton thought back to the play against Orlando last season, when Morant appeared to pause midair to control the basketball before continuing his ascent.“He’s using the scissoring of his legs to basically pass power to himself upward,” Bolton said. “It’s like he’s using his body to create resistance in the air. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a basketball player do it to that extent.”Alex Coker, a tandem instructor for West Tennessee Skydiving, likened Morant’s adaptability under duress to what is required of him in his job taking people thousands of feet in the air before jumping from a plane.Coker compared each of Morant’s leaps to an emergency where he was forced to make a critical decision in milliseconds. Like Morant adjusting midair to account for an incoming defender, Coker’s job requires him to be nimble in a crisis.Morant adjusting as he goes up for a shot against defenders.Justin Ford/Getty Images“There’s pages of malfunctions of all the possibilities that could happen, and it’s very important that every 90 days we look over those emergency procedures of scenarios that we can perform like a secondhand nature,” Coker said. “If it happens you know how to instantly react.”Of course, every jump is not the same for Morant, and neither are those by Ezra Deleon, a BMX racer and coach at Shelby Farms. His leaps can span between 20 and 30 feet, he said.“It’s kind of a controlled chaos in a way,” Deleon said. “You know what you’re doing, but you always have a bunch of variables, like wind, other riders, how the pitch of your jump has a different weight and tosses you up in the air.”While most aerial aficionados focused on Morant’s leaping ability, Shafer spotlighted his descent.Sticking the landing is crucial for Morant, just like it is for Shafer in skateboarding.Several years back, Doran, Shafer’s son who was then 10 years old, tried dunking a basketball after a 360-degree rotation in the air on his skateboard. He broke his tibia and fibula when he did not land properly.“A lot of skateboarding is knowing what to do when we don’t pull off that trick,” Shafer said. “How do we get out of that?”Referring to Morant, Shafer added: “He has to do that every single time he makes a basket. How am I going to get out of this jam after I accomplish my goal?”Flying so high makes Morant especially vulnerable when it comes time to land.Jerome Miron/USA Today Sports, via ReutersMorant, so far, has been lucky while ascendant and vulnerable.“I just worry about finishing the play,” he said.Morant missed two dozen games with knee injuries but returned for the final game of the regular season, allowing for the frequent takeoffs that even those who spend much of their time in the air can only fantasize about.“I would love to be able to just hang in the air for an extra second or two without any apparatus like he can,” Smith said. “The way he moves, it makes me think of being in a dream and moving in ways that we can’t in real life.” More

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      Nets Beat Cavaliers in Play-In and Will Face Celtics Next

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      For three quarters, the Nets again showed their best side. A matchup against the Celtics in the playoffs will require a more complete effort.For much of their N.B.A. play-in game against the Cleveland Cavaliers on Tuesday night, the Nets looked like the fearsome team that many observers had long said lay hidden behind their mediocre record. Kevin Durant was magnificent. Kyrie Irving didn’t miss a shot until the fourth quarter. Multiple teammates made significant contributions well above what was usually expected of them.And yet, the game still came down to the final minutes after Cleveland, which had trailed by 20 points after the first quarter and then by 22 in the third, cut its deficit to 6 with a just over a minute left.The job got done in the end: The Nets pulled out a 115-108 victory to claim the No. 7 seed in the Eastern Conference, and a matchup with the Boston Celtics in the first round. But the game was the latest example of a Nets performance that could be quantified as a head-scratching mix of world-beating talent and worrisome lethargy.For the glass-half-full crowd, the Nets stars Irving and Durant combined for 59 points on 31 shots while handing out 23 assists, another stat-sheet-filling display from one of the most talented tandems in the N.B.A. It was, again, a tantalizing glimpse into what their partnership could be at its peak — a summit that has been a rare sighting in their time together in Brooklyn.Kevin Durant scored 25 points against the Cavaliers, but needed 42 minutes to do it.Sarah Stier/Getty ImagesBut it wasn’t just them. Bruce Brown, the team’s consummate role player, had 18 points, 9 rebounds and 8 assists, often offering himself as a crucial release valve on offense when Durant and Irving would get blitzed by defenders. Andre Drummond punished Cleveland on the boards, scoring 16 points and grabbing 8 rebounds in only 19 minutes. Nic Claxton, the spry reserve center, added 13 points, 9 rebounds and 5 blocks off the bench.But the glass-half-empty set had evidence, too, after the Nets nearly blew yet another lead down the stretch against a lesser team. On Sunday at home against the Indiana Pacers, one of the worst teams in the N.B.A., the Nets endured a similar ending that became uncomfortably close. In the game before that — also against Cleveland — the Nets blew a double-digit, third-quarter lead. Before that was a game against the Knicks, another less talented team playing out the string; the Nets trailed by 21 points in the first half that time.All three of those games required fourth-quarter rallies to win, but all three repeated a pattern that has played out for much of the season: The Nets, while supremely talented in a couple of spots, are a squad that struggles to put together wire-to-wire performances. And in the playoffs, against the best teams in the league, that may be their Achilles’ heel.“That’s a part of our journey too,” Nets Coach Steve Nash said Tuesday of trying to find a way to change his team’s penchant for flirting with disaster. “It’s not just go out there and build 20-point leads. Turn it into 30.”In the opening game of their first-round series on Sunday, the Nets will travel to Boston and find a Celtics squad that is not the same team the Nets easily dispatched last season. And, thanks to the Nets’ Brown, the Celtics now will have some bulletin board material as motivation.Asked about the Celtics on Tuesday, Brown suggested the absence of Robert Williams III, Boston’s starting center and one of the league’s best defenders, would mean that “they have less of a presence in the paint.”Nets forward Bruce Brown drew a rebuke from Durant for some comments about the Celtics. Vincent Carchietta/USA Today Sports, via ReutersThe comments did not sit well with Durant, who dismissed them as “caffeine pride talking.” Brown had said that, with Williams out, the Nets “could attack” Boston’s Al Horford and Daniel Theis, who round out the Celtics’ big man rotation. Durant grimaced and noted, “Them two dudes can do the same stuff.”Durant’s fitness is another lingering concern for the Nets entering the Celtics series. Just getting into the play-in tournament required a heavy workload for Durant, who played 42 minutes on Tuesday night. Since the All-Star break, Durant has averaged 38.6 minutes a game. While other stars around the league were able to manage their minutes — and save their legs — during the stretch run, the 33-year-old Durant had to expend more energy than usual just to drag his team into the playoffs.One way or another, the Nets will enter the playoffs much as they did last season: With high expectations and little time together. Last year, that was a result of injuries and a trade for James Harden. This year, it is a result of injuries and the decision to trade Harden away (not to mention Irving’s extended absence over his refusal to be vaccinated against the coronavirus).“We’re just such a new group,” Nash said. “I think that was like the seventh game those nine players tonight have played together. So every day is a day for us to learn about ourselves.”All season, though, the Nets have bet that talent trumps cohesion. It is why they shuffled players in and out of the rotation with frequency, why they were willing to trade Harden. Tuesday night’s victory showed a tease of the championship potential in the group.In the first three quarters, anyway. More

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      Karl-Anthony Towns and the ‘Swaggy’ Timberwolves Are Ready

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      Towns, the Timberwolves center, said he’s never doubted himself and now he has the right team behind him. “Whatever it takes to win, we will do as a team,” he said.Karl-Anthony Towns has rarely experienced the kind of professional joy he has had this season.It hasn’t been his best year statistically, though he did score a career- and franchise-high 60 points on March 14, becoming the first center since Shaquille O’Neal in 2000 to score 60 points in a game. Nor is it the first time he’s had a shot at the playoffs in Minnesota.But it is, he said, the most supportive and unified team he’s ever been on as a pro.“We’re a swaggy team,” Towns said. “We’ve got great chemistry. We feel very confident in what we can do. We know any time we step on the basketball court, we can beat anyone in the world.”The Timberwolves (46-36) finished the regular season at seventh in the Western Conference, and will face the eighth-place Los Angeles Clippers in the play-in tournament on Tuesday night in Minneapolis. The winner will be the seventh seed in the playoffs and face the Memphis Grizzlies in the first round. The loser will play again on Friday for a chance to be the eighth seed and face the No. 1-seeded Phoenix Suns.If the Timberwolves win this week, they’ll make the playoffs for only the second time since 2004. The only other time during that stretch that Minnesota made the playoffs was in 2017-18, with Jimmy Butler.This year is Towns’s seventh in the N.B.A. since the Timberwolves drafted him first overall in 2015 from the University of Kentucky.Towns spoke with The New York Times about what he loves so much about this team and why he feels more confident in his trash talk these days.This interview has been edited for length and clarity.You’ve grown close with guard Patrick Beverley this season. What did you think of him before you played with him?I always thought of Pat Bev as a pest, you know? Someone you hate to play against but you would love to have on your team. I was right. Having him as a teammate now, you see why so many teams find such amazing value in him, because he is that valuable to a team.Towns described Timberwolves guard Patrick Beverley, right, as “someone you hate to play against but you would love to have on your team.”Andy Clayton-King/Associated PressDo you remember when you started to realize how special he was for this team?I mean, I knew how special he was before, just off his personality and hearing him on the court and everything. I already knew he was a different kind of player. I knew he was special [for the Timberwolves] early on just because the kind of energy he attracts and the kind of energy he expends out. The way he comes to work and the way he approaches work is something I very much appreciate and am very happy to see every day. It makes all of us better, it makes practices better and makes us more engaged.After your 60-point game, you said you hadn’t really been celebrated like that before. What did you mean?Never had that kind of water poured on you, that kind of thing, that kind of celebration for a player, and for it to be me, I’ve never experienced that.I’m so used to feeling like every day at work is another day; regardless of what I put up, it’s what I’m supposed to do. I was supposed to go out there and give ourselves the best chance to win and score at a high rate. So it was just another day at the office. I knew it was a special moment, but it was something I was supposed to do. That’s how I felt.[My teammates] made it more special and they made it something worth celebrating. Like I said, I’ve never been given flowers like that in my career, so it was cool to be appreciated by my teammates and respected by my teammates, but also to be celebrated.Does it help individual players’ confidence, not just yours but everyone’s, to have the kind of closeness as a team you’ve talked about?Yeah, because everyone understands we all want to sacrifice for the betterment of each other and for the betterment of this team. Whatever it takes to win, we will do as a team. I think with winning comes glory for everybody. So we’re fighting for the same thing, and that’s what makes us so dangerous.Given everything you’ve gone through from a basketball sense, did you ever wonder if you’d ever be part of a team like this?No, I never had doubt. I never doubted myself one time for what I could do. I never doubted my skill set, my competitive edge, my competitiveness. I never doubted the work I put in. I knew I just had to wait for my chance. I had to wait for my chance to have a team like this, to have a coaching staff that’s this great. And I’ve had great coaching staffs, but to have a coaching staff mesh with a group of guys the way they have, it builds wins and it builds camaraderie and chemistry. I knew I just needed some stability and a chance and I would run with it and make the most of it.“I walk on the court I feel like I’ve got 14 brothers behind me in anything I do,” Towns said.Nick Wosika/USA Today Sports, via ReutersYou guys got a lot of attention for the way you guys were ribbing and trash-talking the Los Angeles Lakers when they were in Minneapolis in March. You don’t always display that kind of swagger. What has made you feel comfortable showing that side of yourself?Just the chemistry I have with the guys to know that any situation I’m walking into — I feel, we move like a gang. To feel like we move like a gang, not even in a bad sense, in a negative connotation, but just more when I walk on the court I feel like I’ve got 14 brothers behind me in anything I do.It allows me to pull more of my Jersey side. I’m from Jersey. Have that a little bit of trash talk, but more the swag, the confidence we walk around in our neighborhoods with. It’s always great when you feel like you have a team behind you that’s there with you in the trenches, but also winning. You ain’t going to say too much when you’re losing.If the playoff system was like it had been before, you guys would just be in a first-round series. What’s your opinion on the play-in tournament?If we didn’t want to be in the play-in tournament, we should have got more wins and been the sixth or fifth seed. That’s just what it is. I’m not here to complain about any of that. Got to do what you’ve got to do.Are there any ways you’re personally different from the last time you had a shot at the playoffs?My situation is totally different. I’m happy to walk into a situation like this.Can you expand on that?Nah. I don’t want to expand on that. I’m not going back on some past [stuff]. Past is the past. I went through it already once and I’m happy I’m going to go through it this time differently. More