The Golden State Warriors are currently boasting a record of 68-7. With seven games left in the regular season, they have a chance to break one of the most untouchable records in all of sports- the '96 Bulls single season record of 72 wins. Over the next seven games, the Warriors simply have to go 5-2 to break the record. Considering the fact that they've won over 90 percent of their games this season, it seems likely that they can pull off the impossible, right? Wrong.
Two of their last seven games pit them against the San Antonio Spurs, the team with the second best record in the NBA and one of the teams to give the Warriors one of their only losses. As historic as the Warriors season has been so far, the Spurs are making history in their own right. The Spurs and Warriors are both undefeated at home, 38-0 and 36-0 respectively. No team has ever gone a full season without dropping a game at home, with the '86 Celtics going 40-1 in Boston. In their next two meetings, each team will play one game at home. The home team has won each of the two matchups earlier this season.
With history at stake and two of the best basketball teams ever, most fans are salivating at these dream matchups. There's only one problem and his name is Gregg Popovich, the coach of the Spurs. Popovich is notorious for resting his players down the stretch in order to have them at full strength and energized for the playoffs. In 2012, Popovich once sat out star player Tim Duncan, listing him on the official scoresheet as DNP- Old. The next season, Popovich ruffled more feathers by sitting out four of his five starters in a nationally televised game against the defending champion Miami Heat. Popovich was later fined $250,000 because of this, but it hasn't stopped him from doing it again.
The Spurs cannot overtake the Warriors for the top seed in the playoffs and have already clinched the second seed, so there really is nothing to gain by trying to beat the Warriors. With nothing to gain or lose, it seems as if there isn't really a reason to play his best players in the final two matchups against the Warriors.
Frankly, that's not entirely true. With apologies to the Oklahoma City Thunder, a Warriors-Spurs Conference Finals seems inevitable. While each team has beaten the other, neither was at full strength in the losses. In the Warriors' 30-point massacre of the Spurs Tim Duncan, the centerpiece of the Spurs' defense was out with a knee injury. In the second matchup, a home win for San Antonio, the Warriors were without Andre Iguodala, Andrew Bogut, and Festus Ezeli. These teams have yet to play each other at full strength, and given that a playoff matchup is on the horizon, scouting and game planning will be of paramount importance.
There's no better way to do that than to play and see what works and more importantly what doesn't. Gregg Popovich is a coach, who has never run a specific system like Phil Jackson and the Triangle Offense, but instead caters his game plan to the strengths of his players and works even harder to mask their weaknesses. Similarly, Steve Kerr is also a coach, who is able to make adjustments on the fly and really doesn't limit his thinking to just one play style. From the Spurs perspective, it will be extremely important to not just get a feel of how they match up against the Warriors, but see what kinds of small quarter to quarter and half-time adjustments they can force them into making. These smaller adjustments are often small-scale examples of the game to game changes coaches make over the course of a seven game series.
Playing at full strength would also elicit them another advantage, and it is one specifically for the players. The Warriors' "Lineup of Death", which features Draymond Green at center puts five players on the court, who can all dribble, pass, and shoot the ball extremely well. At one point, this lineup put up a +14.4 point differential, and advanced metrics have suggested that if the team played that lineup the entire game, they would win games 157-90. Thus far, the only team to really put out a competitive lineup to it has been the Thunder, but even they couldn't beat the Warriors. Many pundits see the Spurs as the only team in the way of the Warriors and consecutive championships, but the Warriors were not able to trot out the lineup in their last meeting as Iguodala was hurt.
One of the biggest keys for the Spurs to an upset of the Warriors in the playoffs comes down to how they play against the Lineup of Death. Allowing their star players to get exposure playing against it and finding a comfort zone will go a long way towards finding a way to beat it.
That said, there is no way they do it. When asked about what it would mean to go 41-0 at home, Popovich had this to say:
"Absolutely, nothing. Maybe a cup of coffee. Maybe."
Starting guard, Tony Parker also echoed that, when asked about Popovich trying to go for the home record.
"Are you seriously asking me that? He doesn't care at all."
From the historical standpoint of stopping the Warriors breaking the Bulls' record, Popovich probably still won't care. Even if the Spurs beat the Warriors in both games, Golden State would have still have to lose another game to miss out on 73 wins.
While every NBA fan would love to see the Spurs take the matchups seriously, it is difficult to argue with Popovich and his fistful of championship rings.
