Warriors: Who Should Start at Center Against the Spurs?
By Andrew Ites
The Warriors have rotated centers in the starting lineup all season long. Who is the best matchup in their first round playoff series against the Spurs?
The Warriors will almost certainly start Quinn Cook at point guard, Klay Thompson at shooting guard, Kevin Durant at small forward, and Draymond Green at power forward, but the center position is still up in the air.
Zaza Pachulia started the first two games at center when Golden State matched up with the Spurs in last year’s playoffs, but he missed the final two games of that series with a heel injury. The Warriors started JaVale McGee in Game 3 and went small with Patrick McCaw in Game 4 while Zaza was out of the lineup.
Pachulia started in three of the four matchups against the Spurs during the regular season, and the Warriors went 2-1 in those games. The Warriors were missing all four of their All-Stars for most of the game in that one loss.
JaVale McGee got the start in a thrilling 110-107 win over the Spurs, and he had a great night with 13 points, 7 rebounds, and 4 blocks. Pau Gasol was out for that game, which forced San Antonio to play with a smaller starting lineup making it a more favorable matchup for JaVale.
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The Spurs will likely be starting two bigs in this series with LeMarcus Aldridge alongside Pau Gasol, which probably makes this a Zaza matchup.
While David West is the best center on the roster and he may be in the closing lineup, Steve Kerr prefers to bring him off the bench. Jordan Bell might be the second-best center on the team, but he was out of the lineup for much of the second half of the season and he doesn’t have great size. Kevon Looney, Bell and McGee are all probably too small to bang with the Spurs’ bigs in the post all series long.
There will be minutes for almost all of the Warriors’ centers in this series, but I expect Zaza to get the start and David West to see a lot of playing time off the bench.