Back to the future: Warriors vs. Jazz keys revisited

How did Golden State do with their keys to victory against Utah?

Well, that was ugly. So let’s skip the formalities and jump straight into the Golden State Warriors getting their nose broken by the Utah Jazz.

Keep Mitchell inefficient

The key: Hold Donovan Mitchell to a poor or average efficiency night.

The outcome: Mitchell shot 9-for-18 from the field, finishing the night with 23 points. That’s a true-shooting percentage of 59.5%, which is comfortably above league average, and comfortably above Mitchell’s season average.

The Warriors kept Mitchell from being a dominant offensive force, but there’s nothing to be proud of in the way that they limited Mitchell’s efficiency.

Failure. Like pretty much everything Saturday night.

Grading the key: 2 out of 10.

Limit Gobert’s rebounds

The key: Don’t get destroyed on the glass by Rudy Gobert.

The outcome: Gobert snagged 14 rebounds, which is twice as much as the Warriors leader, which was ... gulp ... Steph Curry.

14 rebounds is a lot, but it’s even more when you consider that Gobert played only 24 minutes. As for the Warriors big men? James Wiseman had 5 rebounds in 25 minutes, Draymond Green snagged 4 rebounds in 25 minutes, and Kevon Looney notched 3 rebounds in 13 minutes.

Put those three together and you have 13 rebounds. Again: Gobert had 14.

Failure. Like pretty much everything Saturday night.

Grading the key: 0.5 out of 10.

Chef Curry with the pot

The key: Let Steph Curry cook and cook and cook.

The outcome: Curry was the only Warrior who had a good game, as he finished with 24 points, 7 rebounds, and 7 assists. He shot 9-for-18 from the field and 5-for-10 from distance, passing Reggie Miller for second on the all-time list.

Curry cooked, but at the same time ... 18 shots when the offense is getting beat up isn’t enough. The Warriors still spent a shocking amount of time simply not getting him the basketball.

So did Chef Curry cook? Absolutely. But did the Warriors let him? No, not really.

Grading the key: 4 out of 10.

Make the triples

The key: Get at least 12 three-pointers from the role players.

The outcome: I should have specified this when I wrote the keys, but by “role players” I meant “everyone not named Steph Curry.”

And people not named Steph Curry shot 9-for-29 from beyond the arc. That’s well short of 12, and more importantly, it’s just 31.0%. Not good enough, at all.

Failure. Like pretty much everything Saturday night.

Grading the key: 2.5 out of 10.

Welp.