One month into the 2021-22 NBA season, the Golden State Warriors are back. Despite Sunday's loss to the Charlotte Hornets, they have a league-best 11 wins, and six seasons after winning a record 73 games, they're on a 69-win pace. They seem to have rediscovered their championship-winning recipe from the 2010s, updated it, and are using it to cook the rest of the league.
Tuesday night in Brooklyn, Golden State faces its biggest game of the season so far against Kevin Durant and the Nets. Before the season even started, the sportsbooks had tagged Brooklyn as the favorite to win it all, but just one month into the campaign, it's Durant's former teammates in the Bay Area who are playing the best hoops in the league.
Stephen Curry and the Dubs have emerged as serious contenders to win their fourth NBA title this season. They are back to being a two-way juggernaut, logging a familiar set of elite statistical indicators that harken back to their title runs last decade. Once again, they are among the league leaders in both offensive and defensive efficiency, ranking second in points scored per 100 possessions and first in points allowed.
The Warriors won five straight Western Conference championships in part because they ranked in the top three in offensive efficiency in each of those seasons. But following a rash of high-profile departures and injuries, the Warriors' once-ferocious offense spent the past two seasons near the bottom of the league, ranking 20th in 2020-21 and dead last in 2019-20, when Curry missed all but five games. This season, the Dubs' high-powered offense is back, and it is defined by three main traits:
Fast pace: Golden State ranks fifth in pace and first in fast-break points per game.
Great ball movement: The Warriors rank first in both assists per game and assist percentage.
Elite shooting: Coach Steve Kerr's squad ranks first in 3-pointers per game, effective field goal percentage and true shooting percentage.
Nobody is scoring more points per contest this year than the Warriors in part because they are getting clean looks at the rim more than any other team in the league. According to Second Spectrum's shot quality metric -- which estimates the expected effective field goal percentage for every shot in the league using factors such as shot location, defender proximity and the shooting ability of the shooter -- Golden State's offense is creating the highest-quality shots in the NBA this season. And the ball doesn't stick much in the bay: the Warriors have the fewest dribbles taken per touch and lowest average touch length too.
It all starts with Curry, who is not only one of the most dangerous scorers in the league right now, but also one of its best playmakers too. He has always had a great feel for the game and a great knack for setting up his teammates, but at age 33, he might be having his best passing season ever.
Consider that out of 45 NBA passers who have created at least 100 assist chances this season, no passer has created more efficient opportunities than Curry. The Warriors are averaging a ridiculous 1.34 points per shot on those chances. Curry's dimes have elevated many of the team's role players' abilities to score well, and players such as Draymond Green, Nemanja Bjelica, Otto Porter Jr. and Gary Payton II all possess higher eFG% numbers than Curry does.
Kerr's motion offense has always done a good job of creating opportunities for catch-and-shoot looks from beyond the arc, but the fact that this team is making a league-high 11.1 catch-and-shoot 3s per 100 possessions without the injured Klay Thompson, one of the best catch-and-shoot specialists in league history, should terrify the rest of the league.
Right now, the Warriors' starting group consisting of Curry, Green, Andrew Wiggins, Kevon Looney, and Jordan Poole is racking up 115.8 points per 100 possessions, which is elite, but again, stands to only get better when Thompson returns to action. Thompson is a career 41.9% 3-point shooter, second only to Curry among players who attempt at least five 3-pointers per game.
But while we've all come to expect eye-popping numbers from the Warriors' offense, the team is at its scariest when Green and the defense is playing well, and that's exactly what's happening again this year. In two of their three title runs, the Warriors also possessed a top-three defense, and if present trends hold, they could repeat that feat this season. If they do, they are a major threat to collect another Larry O'Brien Trophy. It's that simple.
Green is the undeniable leader of the Warriors' ferocious defense, which is forcing opponents into taking the second-toughest shots in the league, per Second Spectrum's shot quality metric.
The Warriors' defensive success starts at the point of attack, where they are among the best teams in the league at stifling the pick-and-roll actions of their opponents. By holding opponents to just 0.84 points per pick play, the Warriors rank first in the league at blowing up the bread-and-butter action of modern NBA offenses. In fact, that value -- 0.84 points allowed per play -- is on pace to be the best such mark in the NBA over the past seven seasons. Oh, and they're also the best at defending dribble drives too.
Even when opponents manage to get a shot off from downtown, chances are there's a Warrior nearby. They are contesting 3-pointers at a higher rate than any other squad in the league, but in doing so they are not opening up the interior. In fact, they are also the stingiest defense in the league in the paint, allowing just 40.5 points per game in the lane.
With Curry running the offense and Green running the defense, the Warriors are downright scary, and their numbers prove it. In the 321 minutes that duo has shared the court, the Warriors are outscoring opponents by 14.7 points per 100 possessions, which ranks fourth in the league among duos who've played at least 300 minutes together. But their success goes deeper than that.
If there's one stat that sums up how wild the Warriors have been thus far it's this: Their net rating in the third quarter this year is plus-31.7. During the third quarter this season, the Dubs' offense is scoring 116.6 points per 100 possessions, while the defense is surrendering a measly 84.9 per 100. Both of those numbers are elite, but that defensive marker is off the charts.
In other words, the starters are coming out of the locker room from halftime and absolutely blowing teams off the court -- which was a staple of their championship teams, when frequently post-halftime runs would turn close games into blowouts in the blink of an eye. The Warriors led the NBA in third-quarter scoring differential in each of their three championship runs, and they're doing it again this season, by a significant margin.
The signs are all there, folks, and the numbers don't just suggest the Warriors are legit -- they suggest they are legit in a very familiar way, a way that usually sees Golden State playing deep into June.
If there's one reason to curb the enthusiasm about this red-hot start, it's the fact that the Warriors have had a relatively easy schedule and played more home games than almost any other team in the league. Those are fair points, but they're balanced out by the fact that Thompson and James Wiseman still haven't suited up for any action this season. Once they do, the Warriors stand to be even deeper and even more versatile on both ends.
And while neither will be playing Tuesday night in Brooklyn, the matchup should still be fascinating -- and a possible Finals preview.