The most important, but also most difficult task when playing the Golden State Warriors is trying to slow down and contain Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson aka The Splash Brothers. For the Los Angeles Lakers it was a team effort, but the players primarily tasked with keeping up with the Warriors stars were Jarred Vanderbilt, Dennis Schroder and Austin Reaves.
In the series-clinching Game 6, that Lakers defense was on full display. Curry finished with 32 points, but needed 28 shots to reach it. Thompson meanwhile, struggled mightily with just eight points and the two combined to shoot just 6-of-26 from 3-point range.
For Reaves, in the first playoff run of his career, having to chase around Curry and Thompson was a lot of work, and the second-year guard praised the two stars before showing some love to the Lakers coaches.
“They’re really good, it’s the main thing. Both of em,” Reaves said after the Lakers win. “You see Klay goes 3-for-19, 2-for-12 (3-pointers), it’s not easy. When you have to guard guys that consistently move and the whole team is basically doing what they can do to get them open, it’s not easy. But like I said earlier shoutout to the coaching staff for the chess match that they have to play against the Warriors coaching staff. They were on top of things, schemes, mixing up stuff.”
The Lakers have put a lot on the plate of Reaves, but he has continued to handle it well. After getting off to a rough start in this series, Reaves had his third straight excellent game to help the Lakers end the series, finishing with 23 points, 5 rebounds and 6 assists while hitting 4-of-5 from three-point range.
And now that the series is over, Reaves is thankful he doesn’t have to chase around Curry and Thompson anymore.
“Steph plays a lot more off the dribble than Klay does, but if you give Klay, or either of them, any space at all it’s going up and it’s got a really good chance of going in. But I can’t lie I’m happy I don’t gotta guard them two any more.”
Reaves won’t be able to relax too much however as next round he will surely spend some time defending the Denver Nuggets’ explosive scoring guard Jamal Murray as well as another player who runs around the court a lot in former Lakers guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope.
Lakers’ Austin Reaves receives votes for most underrated and overrated in anonymous NBA Player Poll
An undrafted player in just his second season, Austin Reaves has become one of the most important players for the Lakers ever since the All-Star break. And while some of his NBA peers are recognizing how good of a player he is, others aren’t quite as sold.
In the anonymous NBA Player Poll, Reaves received 3.7% of the votes for the NBA’s most overrated player. He also received 2.1% of the votes for the most underrated. But after his performance in these playoffs, that overrated tag shouldn’t be anywhere near his name again.
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