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Ohm Youngmisuk
SAN FRANCISCO — For the first three quarters of Game 4, Draymond Green thought Jimmy Butler couldn’t move due to the pelvic and deep gluteal muscle contusion injury that kept him out of Game 3.
But in a tense fourth quarter, Butler got loose and delivered 14 of his 27 points while also grabbing a massive defensive rebound in between three Rockets to help the Golden State Warriors put the Houston Rockets on the brink with a 109-106 win in Game 4.
Butler still looked like he was in pain from his scary fall on his tailbone in the first quarter of Game 2 last Wednesday. But his return from a one-game absence pushed the Warriors to within one win of advancing to the Western Conference semis.
“He played through the injury,” Green said. “Was beautiful. But what his presence does for this team is humongous. The first three quarters, he couldn’t move. Not sure how he started moving in the fourth quarter, but he never complained. He stuck with it.
“I think what was most important, when the time was right, everybody on our side looked to get him the ball. When you get him the ball, he made great things happen for himself or for others. It was huge. I think my favorite play was the last rebound. I looked up, I thought it was [young and athletic Jonathan] Kuminga out there flying. It was Jimmy.”
The Warriors trailed by four 4:20 remaining after Fred VanVleet hit one of his eight 3-pointers. Alperen Sengun also took advantage of Green being in foul trouble. In a chippy game, Green picked up his fifth personal foul with 8:06 remaining in the third quarter. He did not return until 7:51 left in the fourth. While Sengun finished with 31 points and 10 rebounds, the Rockets center was held to four points in the final 7:50 of the game. The Rockets were 3-of-16 with Green as their primary defender in Game 4, including Sengun shooting 2-of-11 against the Warriors’ stopper.
One of those missed shots came with 6.4 seconds remaining. The Warriors were clinging to a one-point lead when they went to Sengun in the middle of the floor on Green, who came up with the game-saving stop that was rebounded by Butler.
“Why him?” asked Brandin Podziemski, who hit six 3-pointers and had 26 points. “I don’t know why you’d go after the Defensive Player of the Year.”
Butler, who had hit three big free throws with 58.7 seconds left to break a 104-104 tie after a foul on Dillon Brooks, sealed the game with two more free throws with four seconds to go.
Afterward, Warriors coach Steve Kerr said if this were the regular season, Butler would “probably miss another week or two.”
“But it’s the playoffs,” Kerr said. “He’s Jimmy Butler, so this is what he does. The rebound at the end was just incredible, the elevation, the force. Then, of course, knocking down the free throws to clinch it. Jimmy was just amazing.”
Butler admitted he was hurting.
“A lot of pain,” Butler said.
But he said “it was winning time” in the fourth quarter. And he also says he got a boost from some talking from Brooks.
“Your body starts to warm up, you start to match a little bit better, you gain confidence,” Butler said. “People start talking to you. Then good things happen.”
Butler was later asked about how he and Brooks got into it and looked like they were having fun.
“No, we’re not having fun,” Butler said. “Get me on the record with this: I don’t like Dillon Brooks. We’re never having fun. I’m a fierce competitor. He’s a fierce competitor. There ain’t nothing fun about that.”
The Warriors had a lot of fun at the end of this game as Butler and Green let out primal screams following Green’s stop on Sengun and Butler’s rebound. And Stephen Curry, who was held to 17 points after having 36 in Game 3, shouted in celebration at both Butler and Green after the buzzer.
Now Golden State looks to close the Rockets out in Game 5 in Houston on Wednesday.
“They’re always the hardest ones,” Kerr said of a close-out game. “Every team that’s in the playoffs, especially a team like Houston, 2 seed, 52 wins, big-time team. They got a lot of pride, great coach. They’re going to be ready. We got a long way to go. We know Game 5 will be the toughest one yet.”
