The Weekly Dish

The arrival of the New Year is as fitting a time as any to look back and reflect on what the Warriors accomplished in 2016.

For the week of Monday, Jan. 2 – Sunday, Jan. 8

The Warriors closed out 2016 in the only fitting way possible – that is, with multiple victories.

As we embark upon the New Year, now is as good a time as any to look back and reflect on the year Golden State just had. It was replete with great times, with a few down moments infrequently mixed in, but on the whole, the Warriors’ 2016 campaign will go down as one of the most successful calendar years in NBA history.

With their win over Dallas on Friday, Golden State finished 2016 with a record of 72-12 (.857) in regular season games, the exact same mark the Warriors posted in 2015. Those are tied for the second-highest winning percentage in a calendar year in NBA history, trailing only the 1996 Chicago Bulls, who went 74-11 (.871). However, Golden State’s combined regular-season record over the 2015 and 2016 calendar years of 144-24 (.857) is the best winning percentage in consecutive years in NBA history. Given how often they’ve won, it’s been easy to take the Warriors’ frequent and prolonged success for granted, but make no mistake, what they’ve done over the last two years is nothing short of remarkable.

The success hasn’t been limited to the team alone, obviously. The Warriors roster is filled with individuals who have garnered significant accolades for their on-court accomplishments over that same span, and if you include postseason production, their players rank near the top of the league in almost every major statistical category.

For instance, no player in the NBA played in more games or for more minutes in 2016 than Klay Thompson’s 108 and 3,696, respectively. Thompson’s 2,490 points in 2016 ranked as the fifth-most in the league throughout the calendar year, while Stephen Curry (2,725) and Kevin Durant (2,704) ranked as the top two scorers in the league.

Curry led all NBA players with 468 three-pointers in 2016, while Thompson was second in the Association with 383. Kyle Lowry, with 272, was the next closest competitor.

Curry and Draymond Green ranked second and third in the NBA with 189 and 182 steals in 2016, and no player posted a better individual plus-minus than Green’s +1,098. For reference, Curry (+1,011) and Thompson (+943) were right behind him in second and third, respectively.

Now, granted, the Warriors played more games in 2016 than any other team in the league, so the year-end totals can be somewhat inflated by that fact. However, the reason they played more games than anyone else was due to their overwhelming success as a team, and as they say, to the victor goes the spoils.

Golden State didn’t accomplish everything they wanted in 2016, but that doesn’t make it a down year. In fact, it was quite the opposite. As the Dubs move forward into 2017, they can look back on the year they had and know without a doubt that they put together one of the most successful calendar years in the history of their sport.

Speaking of a year of highlights, I’d be remiss to go this entire column without mentioning Kevin Durant’s arrival in Golden State. His decision to join the Warriors as a free agent shook the foundation of the league back in July, and Durant’s play through his first 34 games with his new team has done nothing but confirm and validate the lofty expectations that came along with it. Durant, quite simply, has been one of the best players in the entire league. He posted averages of 20.5 points, 14.0 rebounds and 8.5 assists last week, and in Golden State’s win over Toronto on Wednesday, Durant became the first player in franchise history with at least 20 points, 15 rebounds, five assists and five blocks in the same game. Durant then followed that performance up with 19 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists in the Warriors victory over the Mavericks, tallying a triple-double in the first three quarters of a game for the second time in his career.

He’s now averaging 25.9 points, 8.9 rebounds and 1.6 blocks per game on the season, and leads Golden State in all three of those categories. His field goal percentage (.537) is not only the highest of his decorated career; it’s also the highest percentage in the league of any player averaging at least 14 shots per game. There are very few players in the NBA having as large of an impact on both ends of the court on a nightly basis as Durant has for the Warriors’ thus far, and he’s proven to be precisely the two-way weapon Golden State and their fans were hoping for.

The Warriors open 2017 play with a week filled with Western Conference opponents. Golden State will finish off its current five-game homestand with the final three games of that slate, beginning on Monday night against the visiting Denver Nuggets. The Dubs will have a day off in between all of their games this week, as they’ll host the Trail Blazers and Grizzlies on Wednesday and Friday, respectively, before making the short jaunt up to Sacramento for a road matchup with the Kings on Sunday. Only a half-game currently separates the Trail Blazers from the Nuggets and Kings for the eighth spot in the West, so this week offers a glimpse at several potential first round playoff matchups. The Warriors are coming off the most successful two-year run in the history of the NBA, and the first week of 2017 presents their first opportunity to attempt to extend that to a third.