DETROIT — Despite having Stephen Curry back on the court for the first time in more than three weeks, Steve Kerr said he had perhaps “one of my worst performances as a coach” after the Golden State Warriors lost in Detroit on Saturday night.
After seeing the Pistons outshoot the Warriors from 3-point range, making twice as many 3s (12-to-6) while launching nine more 3-point attempts, Kerr pointed the finger at himself after Golden State’s 111-102 loss.
“I did not like our offense tonight,” Kerr said of the Warriors, who shot 45.9 percent overall. “I’ve gotta do a better job honestly. Tonight was probably a game I could mark down as one of my worst performances as a coach honestly.”
“All in all, I’ve got do a better job than I’ve done here the first couple months of the season,” Kerr later added. “This is … just gotta get better. We’ve gotta get better shots. We gotta get more spacing, get better flow.”
The Warriors, who are still missing Draymond Green (toe), have now lost six consecutive road games. Prior to this slide, Kerr’s Warriors had not lost more than three straight on the road during his tenure. Golden State (15-9) has also dropped eight of its past 13 games.
Kerr, who has three championships in his first four seasons as head coach of the Warriors, did not like the spacing he saw on the floor or some of the combinations he used. The Warriors shot 6-for-26 from 3-point range even with Curry returning after an 11-game absence due to a groin injury. Detroit (13-7) made 12 of 35 from behind the arc.
On the season, the Warriors have taken 710 3-pointers, but opponents have hoisted 110 more from 3-point range.
“I’m just tired of seeing three people in the paint every time we are penetrating,” Kerr said. “The paint is so bunched up. I know we are top-heavy with our shooting. We’ve got obviously some of the great shooters in our starting lineup but we’ve got a lot of guys that are coming off the bench or been in the lineup who are not 3-point shooters or aren’t shooting 3s.
“So I’ve got to do a better job of finding combinations that work and find spacing that works,” Kerr continued. “Because right now, what we’re [seeing] is not working.”
Curry made 10 of 21 shots, but was just 3-for-9 from behind the arc, before finishing with 27 points and five rebounds to go with seven turnovers.
Kevin Durant scored 28 points but missed 6 of 7 3-point attempts while Klay Thompson had 21 points but missed 4 of 5 from behind the arc. This was the 84th time the trio has combined to take 20 3-pointers in a game together, but it was just the fifth time they finished with five or fewer 3-pointers made in those games, according to ESPN Stats & Information research.
“It’s something that we just got to watch film and see where we can create better opportunities for us to shoot 3s,” Durant said. “Sometimes our spacing is a little messed up and that’s on the leaders on the team out on the floor to get that in order.”
The Warriors will attempt to end their road slide at Atlanta (5-18) on Monday night.
“It’s not on Steve,” Thompson said of Kerr taking the blame. “I think it’s on us. We didn’t play with the greatest sense of urgency tonight. Give Detroit credit … But we didn’t make it tough on them at all. They were too comfortable.”
“So when we go to Atlanta, we got to come out — I don’t care what Atlanta’s record is — we got to play as hard as we can.”