OAKLAND — Klay Thompson pointed his finger directly at himself after the San Antonio Spurs rolled into Oracle and outrebounded the Golden State Warriors 55-35 in the team’s 129-100 opening night loss.
“There were times when I was too lazy and not really getting after those loose balls like I should have,” Thompson said following practice on Wednesday afternoon. “Regardless if it’s Oct. 25, I’ve got to play with an edge and I didn’t last night. And I will. I know I will.”
Thompson vowed that the poor night on the glass won’t be the start of a problematic trend for the undersized Dubs.
“We’ll be one of the better rebounding teams this year. I know we will,” Thompson said. “We played one of the best in the league, obviously, last night but it got exposed that we need to work on and, honestly, that’s a good thing.”
Head coach Steve Kerr agreed with the assessment of his shooting guard that the Warriors exhibited a lack of hustle against the Spurs.
“The tape doesn’t lie,” Kerr said. “We didn’t box out. There were numerous plays where we made a stop and everybody just looked up at the ball coming off the rim instead of putting a body on somebody, hitting somebody and then chasing the ball down.”
Starting center Zaza Pachulia produced an especially poor debut on the boards, pulling down just three rebounds in his 20 minutes on the floor. But Kerr wasn’t ready to focus the blame on the Warriors’ new big man.
“We’re going to have to be a group rebounding team,” Kerr said. “We can’t rely on anybody to just go up and grab it. Everybody’s got to participate.”
