Watching this year’s NBA Finals so far dominated by the Golden State Warriors most people see the outstanding performances of Steph Curry making 30 PPG by shooting 46.2% from the field and 45.5% from three-point range along with 8 REB and 10.5 AST. This can only be topped by Kevin Durant with 35.5 PPG with ridiculous 56.3 % from the field and 50% from beyond the arc adding 11 REB and 7 AST. With these historic stat lines, also thanks to the atrocious defense of the CAVS Klay Thompson may not stand out with 14 PPG and a 39.3 FG% and 33.33 3P% even adding the fact that the Splash Brother had 22 Point on 8-12 Shooting in Game two.
Offense wins games defense wins Championships
But taking a deeper look what is most impressive how Thompson shows off his defensive skills which do not come into everybody’s mind who associates the guard with his sharp shooting from three-point range and his ridiculous scoring skills. While the Warriors, in general, played great defense Thompson lets opponents only shoot 27.6 % defending 29 field goal attempts per game. Further, he mostly defends elite scoring guards like Kyrie Irving and J.R. Smith (who is arguably in a big slump regardless of Klay´s defense) but as well looked good on switches against Lebron James and Kevin Love.
Another example defending Kevin Love in the post of the switch.
Especially when Klay Thompson and the Warriors can hold Irving to 19 Points shooting 8 from 23 like in Game two they have another huge advantage since the scoring and creation of Kyrie is seen as the X-Factor despite Lebron James to the Cavs road to success.
All in all, this should provide you a little overview on how Klay Thompson`s share on the defense end provides
to the great overall Finals performance of the Golden State Warriors.