Golden State, Klay Thompson take home golden NBA crown

Golden State Warriors beat Boston Celtics to win 2022 NBA Finals

TREVOR JUNT, Evergreen deputy sports editor

The Golden State Warriors beat the Boston Celtics on Thursday night, clinching the 2022 NBA Finals in six games. This is their fourth title in the past eight years.

As time expired Stephen Curry was seen in tears of joy at the journey it took to get to this championship which helped cement his legacy as one of the best players in the history of the NBA.

After Curry was brought back down to earth with a horrendous shooting night in Game 5, he shot right back up in game 6 scoring 34 points with seven rebounds, seven assists and two steals. He went 12/21 and 6/11 from three.

Curry ended the series averaging 31 points per game. He is the first player in Finals history to average 20 points, five rebounds, five assists and five threes. He finished the series shooting a field goal percentage of 48.2% and 43.7% from three even with the game he shot 0/9 from the arc.

Curry was also able to win the coveted Bill Russell NBA Finals Most Valuable Player Award, which seemed like the only hardware that was missing from his collection of awards. Now he is a two-time regular season MVP, four-time NBA Champion, an NBA Finals MVP, an NBA All-Star Game MVP, eight-time All-Star and an eight-time All-NBA selection.

This was also a triumphant return for WSU great Klay Thompson, who had a break of 941 days where he did not play professional basketball because of a torn ACL in 2019 and a torn Achilles in late 2020. With these injuries and multiple setbacks, it was impressive what he was able to do this season and during the playoffs. Although he did not blow up like a usual “Game 6 Klay” game, he was able to contribute to this championship run throughout the season.

Draymond Green, the final part of Golden State’s Big-Three dynasty was under much heat from critics after a rough stretch of a few offensive performances, but in this game was able to put up 12 points, 12 rebounds and eight assists going 2/5 from three. He played particularly well on the defensive end, with two steals and two blocks along with intensity that does not show up on the stats sheet.

For the Warriors, Andrew Wiggins played well with 18 points, six rebounds, five assists, four steals, and two blocks shutting down Jayson Tatum on defense. Gary Payton II played important defense in this game with 3 steals and 1 block. Jordan Poole scored 15 points going 3/8 from three giving him 15 threes in the series off the bench which is the second most in NBA Finals history.

It was a rough night for the Boston Celtics as their starters combined for 18 turnovers. 22 overall for the team. Losing the turnover battle by seven.

The Celtics made some runs of high scoring throughout the game, at the start of the first quarter and at the start of the third. None of it was enough to fight off the Warriors. The team was just unable to put up enough points to win and were not able to stop the Warriors offensive attack.

Jaylen Brown was the leading scorer for Boston scoring 34 with 7 rebounds and 3 assists shooting 12/23 and 5/11 from three. The Celtics other star Jayson Tatum was only able to score 13 points with 3 rebounds and 7 assists shooting 6/18 for the game. Both stars committed 5 turnovers.

Robert Williams III was able to be a force on the defensive side swatting away five different balls. But the entire defensive side did not do enough to stop the offense of Curry.

The Celtics have a relatively young corps. Consisting of Marcus Smart the oldest at 28 years old, Robert Williams III at 24, and the two superstars Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum being 25 and 24.

It can be argued that their youth and inexperience helped contribute to this loss. The Celtics already have the second-best odds to win the title next season and can be contenders for years to come.

Being the fourth title in eight years for the Warriors, if they were not considered a dynasty before they definitely are now. This puts them up with the 80’s Lakers and Celtics, 90’s Bulls, and early 00’s Lakers.

If the Warriors are able to retain the roster that they have currently-or something close to it. They should be early favorites for the title in 2023.