The Golden State Warriors missed an opportunity to grab hold of the fourth-seed in the Western Conference on Sunday, falling 106-96 to the Houston Rockets in a physical game at Chase Center.
With a logjam in the standings that now sees five teams all with 32 losses, the playoffs have started early as the fight to avoid the dreaded Play-In Tournament deepens into the final days of the regular season.
As a result, we're getting a clear indication of what the postseason rotation will look like from Warrior head coach Steve Kerr. Recent games, and particularly Sunday's loss to the Rockets, has provided a couple of different moves that could frustrate fans moving forward.
Quinten Post and Gui Santos' minutes were limited on Sunday
Impressive rookie center Quinten Post had become Golden State's number one center over the second-half of the season, but that could be on the precipice of changing on the eve of the postseason.
There was always some concern on whether Kerr's trust in such an inexperienced player would extend to the highest stake situations, and those concerns have been validated over the last three games.
After playing less than 15 minutes against the Los Angeles Lakers and Denver Nuggets, Post saw less than seven against the Rockets. Instead, Kerr went to the old reliable option of Kevon Looney, with the 3x champion playing over 22 minutes on Sunday after playing nearly 18 against the Nikola Jokic-led Nuggets.
Perhaps part of this are the matchups of facing Jokic and another supremely talented center in Alperun Sengun, but there's also a feel that Kerr is just going back to his tried and tested veteran who holds plenty of big-game experience.
The same may be said in regard to Gary Payton II who played over 20 minutes in his second game back from a thumb injury. The veteran guard did play well with 16 points, five rebounds, two assists and three steals off the bench, but it did come at the expense of Gui Santos who saw less than four minutes. That's the least amount of playing time the Brazilian forward has seen since February 2 in Orlando, and comes after he played crucial late minutes against the Nuggets on Friday.
This is not to say that Kerr's decisions on Sunday were a mistake, but there's little doubt that some fans will be left frustrated if Post and Santos are removed from the rotation after playing such a pivotal role over the past 20 or 30 games.
There's now four games left in the regular season where we'll find out whether Sunday was more about a specific matchup, or whether this was a sign of things to come in the postseason and truly means trouble for the young Warriors duo.