One person who will not be at Oracle Arena is Golden State Warriors part-owner Mark Stevens, who has been banned from the rest of the finals after his confrontation with the Raptors’ Kyle Lowry in Game 3. His behavior, which included directly cursing out Lowry, has led to universal condemnation around the NBA. Lowry seemed to speak for players in general with his comments about Stevens:
“There’s no place for that. He had no reason to touch me. He had no reason to reach over two seats and then say some vulgar language to me. There’s no place for people like that in our league.”
Preamble
In one respect, the Toronto Raptors have only done what they absolutely had to do to have a realistic shot of winning the NBA Finals. In a stretch of games where the Golden State Warriors have been without Kevin Durant, their best player, the Raptors won an emotional Game 1 at home and then took advantage of the additional absences of Klay Thompson and Kevon Looney in Game 3. With that, the Raptors struck their opponents when they’ve been at their weakest and now lead the series 2-1.
To say this is not to deny the Raptors their due credit. Heck, they even had their chances in Game 2 where they had a genuine chance to tie the game in the final minute. In an alternate universe, they have a 3-0 lead in the Finals right now. They’ve done all of this without even a hero game from Kawhi Leonard yet.
Now it’s the Warriors who have a must-win before them as they can’t afford to fall to 3-1. Golden State is too banged up and the Raptors are too formidable of an opponent for them to just assume that they can pull off three straight wins, two of them on the road. The good news for the Warriors is that the reinforcements are coming. While Durant is still out, Thompson and (somehow) Kevon Looney, playing with a broken collarbone, will be returning for tonight’s Game 4.
While it’s a shame that injuries have played a factor here, it can’t be denied that this has become a quite interesting Finals to this point. In fact, it’s difficult to predict where we’re headed from here, which feels rather unusual considering the usual air of inevitability that accompanies the Warriors. Could Game 4 be the point where this series finally comes into focus? Let’s find out together, shall we? As always, you can contribute to this blog by either sending us email (to [email protected]) or tweets (to @HunterFelt). Opening tip is set sometime around 9:00pm EST, but we’ll be back before then to document the leadup to Game 4 of the NBA Finals between the Toronto Raptors and the Golden State Warriors at Oracle Arena.