Warriors take little solace in NBA acknowledging blown call

OAKLAND, Calif. (KTVU/AP) - The fact that the NBA acknowledged missing a late travel call on Oklahoma City's Russell Westbrook, did little to appease Golden State coach Steve Kerr a day later.

When told that NBA senior vice president for replay and referee operations Joe Borgia went on NBA TV after the game and said Westbrook did drag his pivot foot before calling timeout with 17.2 seconds to play and Oklahoma City leading by three, Kerr let out a sarcastic response.

"Yes! Yes!" he said after practice Tuesday. "Yes, that's awesome."

The play happened with the Warriors trailing 105-102 in Game 1 of the Western Conference finals on Monday night and denied them a chance at a potential game-tying 3-pointer.

After the timeout, Westbrook was fouled and made one free throw to make it a two-possession game and the Thunder went on to win 108-102. The NBA also acknowledged in its Last Two Minute Report released Tuesday that officials missed a travel call on Golden State's Stephen Curry after Westbrook's made foul shot. But that had little impact on the game because Curry missed the shot.

Kerr said he would prefer that the NBA not announce when officials blow calls but he understands why the league does it.

"I don't like the practice," he said. "I appreciate the NBA trying to be transparent, but it's unfair to the officials. I feel like it throws them under the bus. They have an impossible job. They really do. And there are going to be bad calls both ways every game. They're never going to be perfect. They're doing the best they can. I don't think there's any point personally in exposing bad calls. It doesn't serve a purpose to me."

So it was back to work at the Warriors practice facility after a lengthy film session in which the Warriors think they figured out what went wrong, and how to fix it.  "i just didn't think we ever really executed well," said Kerr.

Specifically the Warriors say they didn't pass the ball well, and took too many early shots, especially in the second half.  Sloppy play and poor shooting didn't help either.

But there is no panic on the Warriors.  Far from it.  In fact they take solace in the fact that twice during last year's title run they had to battle back from 2-1 series defecits (Memphis and Cleveland).  

However, they've never been down 1-0 in any series since Kerr took over the team two years ago so in that sense this is uncharted territory.  "When I saw Steph after the game," said Green, "he smiled and said, we ain't been here before.  I said yeah I know I like this.  This will be fun because when you can bounce back from something like this it makes it all the more sweeter."