STEPHEN Curry led a high-percentage attack with 21 points and the Golden State Warriors dominated the visiting Dallas Mavericks on both ends of the floor en route to a 112-87 victory on Wednesday in Game 1 of the Western Conference finals in San Francisco.
Mavericks star Luka Dončić, coming off a 35-point, 12-for-19 shooting game in Dallas’ elimination of the top-seeded Phoenix Suns on Sunday, was harassed into just six-for-18 shooting and a playoffs season-low 20 points.
Dallas dropped Game 1 in its third consecutive series.
Game 2 in the best-of-seven set is scheduled for Friday in San Francisco, where Golden State, seeking its sixth trip to the NBA Finals in the past eight years, has gone 7-0 this postseason.
Taking advantage of the Mavericks’ poor shooting — Dallas finished the game at 36% — the Warriors never trailed over the final 45 minutes while taking a 1-0 lead for the third consecutive time this postseason.
All seven Warriors who played at least 13 minutes scored in double figures, with Curry getting plenty of help. Andrew Wiggins and Jordan Poole contributed 19 points apiece, Klay Thompson had 15 and Kevon Looney, Draymond Green and Otto Porter Jr. each had 10.
Golden State shot 56.1% from the field, led by Looney’s 5-for-5, Porter’s 5-for-7 and Poole’s 8-for-12.
Neither team shot well from 3-point range, but the Warriors shot far fewer. They made 10 of 29 (34.5%), while the Mavericks jacked up 48, making 11 (22.9%).
Curry and Wiggins nailed three treys apiece, with Curry also finding time for a game-high 12 rebounds and the game’s only double-double.
Green grabbed nine rebounds.
Wiggins played as big a role on the defensive end as on offense, blanketing Dončić most of the night and holding him four points below his previous low this postseason, that coming in Game 6 against the Utah Jazz in the first round. Dončić had at least 26 points in each of the seven games in the Phoenix series.
Dončić went just 3-for-10 on 3-point attempts, as did teammate Reggie Bullock, who finished with 12 points.
Spencer Dinwiddie had 17 points off the bench and Jalen Brunson scored 14 for the Mavericks, lost their first three road games of the Phoenix series by an average of 19 points before stunning the defending Western Conference champs in Game 7 on Sunday. — Reuters
