As the Golden State Warriors fell to the Portland Trail Blazers, 127-123, their path to contention for the NBA Cup became much, much murkier.
Although this, in and of itself, is not the end of the world, one troubling development, the excellent performance of opposing center Donovan Clingan, served as an indication of a concerning trend for the team moving forward: their inability to limit opposing teams with super-sized centers.
On the night, Clingan had a season-high 22 points to go along with 10 rebounds and four assists, and, although Al Horford left the game in the fourth quarter with hamstring tightness, their centers were still unable to prevent an offensively struggling young center from dominating them in the paint throughout the course of the entire game. If this is a trend that continues, it could come to represent the downfall of Golden State this season.
Warriors still have a major defensive issue as they attempt to mount a championship run
Last season, although the Warriors finished the year as one of the best defensive teams in the NBA, they still maintained a glaring hole in their roster. They needed a rim-protecting, floor-spacing center who could allow Draymond Green to return to his natural position on a more consistent basis.
Although Green is one of the league's most capable defenders, he is, frankly, undersized for the center position, and the toll on his body that defending opposing big men took was not worth the temporary benefit that those lineups provided the team with.
Horford, and his signing with Golden State in free agency, was meant to represent the solution to this issue. Yet, even with him on the roster, the team has alternated Quinten Post and Green in and out of the starting center spot, and Horford has come off the bench in every game he has played so far.
Neither of these players are particularly well-suited to defend that position (or, with Post, any position really), and, as a result, the Warriors have allowed an average of 51.3 points to opponents in the paint this season.
Clingan's performance, therefore, is particularly troubling. Although he is gaining momentum on the offensive end, he has scored in single digits in ten of his team's 16 games. At 7'2" and 280 lbs, Golden State very clearly has no one that is capable of matching up with him throughout the course of an entire game, and Clingan took full advantage.
As the season wears on, the Warriors will need to find a way to limit opposing centers in the paint, and, until they can do so, their ceiling as a threatening defensive team will be severely limited.