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Golden State Warriors: Previewing what opening night might be like

By Max Clemence

CLEVELAND, OH - JUNE 08: Stephen Curry #30 of the Golden State Warriors celebrates with the Larry O'Brien Trophy after defeating the Cleveland Cavaliers during Game Four of the 2018 NBA Finals at Quicken Loans Arena on June 8, 2018 in Cleveland, Ohio. The Warriors defeated the Cavaliers 108-85 to win the 2018 NBA Finals. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by Jason Miller/Getty Images)
CLEVELAND, OH - JUNE 08: Stephen Curry #30 of the Golden State Warriors celebrates with the Larry O'Brien Trophy after defeating the Cleveland Cavaliers during Game Four of the 2018 NBA Finals at Quicken Loans Arena on June 8, 2018 in Cleveland, Ohio. The Warriors defeated the Cavaliers 108-85 to win the 2018 NBA Finals. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by Jason Miller/Getty Images) /
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Opening night is 38 days away what are we to expect on the Golden State Warriors opening night versus the Oklahoma City Thunder?

A good mental exercise is to look back at previous opening nights for our Golden State Warriors to get an idea of what could be reoccurring themes for the Warriors in the first game of the regular season.

The last three opening nights featured strong Western Conference rivals that have challenged the Warriors dominance on the way to their four consecutive NBA Finals appearances.

In 2015-2016 after their first championship in almost 40 years (shoutout Rick Barry), the Warriors played the New Orleans Pelicans, who featured a young Anthony Davis. The Warriors won in dominant fashion to kick off one of the strongest regular season openings in league history.

In 2016-2017 the first year with KD, in one of the weirder opening nights, the Warriors were blown out by the San Antonio Spurs led by Kawhi Leonard.

That was only a minor speed bump for the 2016-2017 Warriors as they steamrolled to 67-15 in the regular season and 16-1 in the playoffs. That Warriors squad was something else.

Then we had 2017-2018 opening night featuring the Houston Rockets with Chris Paul and James Harden. Fans watched an epic playoff level game that went down to the last second and a waved off game-winner by KD.

The Warriors have quite an up and down opening night record and are 1-2 in the last 3 years.

Ultimately how the Warriors perform on opening night has little impact on the rest of their games, but they have the potential to be really exciting as we saw in 2015-2016 and 2017-2018.

I am personally very jazzed to see what the pettiness level will be between the Thunder and the Warriors.

Last year and the year before we got some epic games between the two with some great cat-calling, flexing, and hold-me-back bro moments.

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I anticipate we will get a taste of this maybe not at the same fervor as when KD went back to OKC, but pettiness sells so expect every moment to be heavily documented and over analyzed to death.

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